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one-rosy-sock · 3 years ago

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Coming Undone | Abner Krill x fem!Reader (1/2)

Go to the {Ao3 Link} for more info...

Fandom: The Suicide Squad (2021) Rating: T (M for future chapter) Summery: You’re a psychiatrist. You should know the warning signs when a relationship with a patient is becoming problematic. But you refuse to consider this, because Abner Krill is a lot of things, and violent is not one of them. Warnings: PTSD, childhood abuse, trauma, brief mention of past suicide attempt.

Notes: no use of y/n Disclaimer: Author is NOT a real therapist. I do not own DC comics. __ The first time you met Abner Krill, he was recommended to you by a colleague at Belle Reve.

It had been several weeks since the convicted metahumans defeated Starro, that giant one-eyed starfish. Sometimes it amazes you to no end what strange things exist in this world. The Corto Maltese coup and monster defeat held onto headlines for several weeks until the next big thing came to top it. Seeing such exciting news affect your patients wasn’t unusual, but to have a high profile patient be a part of such news was a first, you’ll admit.

As for you, well, things were pretty much the same. You see your patients during the week at your office. You’re a licensed psychiatrist, and oftentimes you see men and women who have been convicted of a felony or are ex-prisoners themselves. It wasn’t a dream job for many women, much less anyone, to counsel people so troubled. You aren’t like everyone else, though. No, you might not have x-ray vision or super strength, or any super fancy gear to punch bad guys, but you do have a gift not many have: A good ear and an open heart.

And a prescription notepad, but you are determined to make your sessions more than just a pill dispensary.

You are aware of who Abner Krill is. The Polka-Dot Man. One of the metahumans who went to Corto Maltese and defeated Starro. This has partially immortalized him in the media as a superhero, despite his past as a prisoner. Some of your patients were metahumans too, but none as powerful or as widely known as the Polka-Dot Man. His identity and those of his teammates had been concealed from the general public. As of last week, you know his real name.

His appointment’s in the morning on a Tuesday. Your secretary came by as you were straightening up your office to let you know he had arrived. You fluff the couch pillows, throw blanket over the back, tissue box on the side table, a mild scent infuser on your desk. The century-old computer at your desk whirls to cool itself off. Earlier you'd taken the time to shoot an email to Ms. Waller confirming Mr. Krill's appointment.

You follow your secretary up front. She goes to her desk and you step into the waiting room.

Though foolish, you half expected to see Abner in his super suit. The polka dot suit and headgear. Instead, he’s wearing a pair of khaki trousers that hugged high over his hips, and a somewhat flashy, silk button-up tucked neatly into the waist. And, dare you say, a fanny pack. His outfit looked straight out of the 70s or 80s. You don’t know the definitive difference between the decades. But his shirt looks clean and pressed, the collar tucked down nicely. He has one leg over a knee, bouncing it rhythmically as he watches the fish swim around the tank in the wall. It looks like he tried to read a magazine, but stopped halfway, finger wedged between the pages.

“Mr. Krill?”

He jerked in response to his name, swinging his head up with a guilty look gleaming in his eyes. You think of a puppy who’s been caught peeing on the carpet. His expression, or perhaps the way his face was structured, reminded you of a puppy too. His face was somewhat sallow, somewhat droopy. Lines indicate a lot of frowning. Like a sad, droopy cartoon dog. His face narrowed down from his eyes, making his red cupid’s bow mouth seem small. A strong, straight nose dominates his face. His big eyes seem dark and questioning. Like a scared, lost child.

Krill quickly shoots up like a bean sprout, shaking his hands out. The magazine drops to the floor. He swears, bends down to pick it up, and anxiously fusses over righting it on the coffee table. You watch the way the glossy purple cuffs wave as he moves about in jerky, quick moves.

“Good morning, doctor,” he greets warily, avoiding your gaze and staring at your shoes.

“You must be Abner,” you smile. You reach out your hand. In a painful, pregnant pause he visibly wavers as he stares at your hand as if you’d stuck out a gun at him. Finally, he reaches out to take your hand.

He has a strong grip. Sweaty hands.

Hastily, he pulls away.

“Nice to meet you. Why don’t we head on back?”

He nods. His legs are long yet his steps uncertain, reminding you of a gangly adolescent. He follows you down the hall from the waiting room and awkwardly stands by as you open the door to your private office. You hear him pat his thighs as he waits. Like a shadow, he follows and sticks close but careful not to touch. Barely making a sound.

After your office door clicks shut, the two of you sit in your respective places. Your desk chair has a high back, cloaked in a fraying, multicolor knitted throw blanket. A bit garish against the dull beige walls and simple yet whimsical desk decorations beside you. There’s a poster that reads It’s OK to feel this way: over a circle divided by colors and sections, listing different emotions.

You pull your knees up and begin to take off your shoes.

Your patient stares in visible confusion.

“Would you like to take your shoes off?” You ask, setting your shoes aside as you straighten up in your chair. “I find it easier to relax without them.”

“Um…” he trails off, his downturned mouth pursing as he considers this. The tension rolling off him makes him stiff and hard to read. All you’re getting from him so far is how much he doesn't want to be here.

You watch him while occupying your hands with things on your desk so he doesn’t feel pressured to make a decision. From the corner of your eye, you watch him swallow, Adam's apple bobbing, and he slowly reaches down to untie and slip off his oxford shoes. He sets them neatly beside his feet. Hands tucked in his lap, sock feet on the ground. Looking up at you somewhat imploringly.

“This is a safe space, Abner,” you smile at him. You have your clipboard and pen in your lap, but you make yourself relaxed and as welcoming as you can. Note-taking can be done later. Visibly, at least. Don’t want to make him think you’re already assessing him before y'all begin to talk. Can’t force him to talk.

Ex-prisoners often struggle with reforming to civilization after release. He couldn’t be forced to attend therapy here despite the outside forces that pressured him to. If he wanted to walk out, he could. Abner was so tense he seemed to be walking on eggshells. He struggled to relax his shoulders, like his limbs were too long for his body. During all this, he hadn’t met your gaze one.

“Whatever we talk about won’t leave this room, unless, for instance, you said you plan to hurt yourself or someone else.”

This gets a reaction out of him. A grimace, a shake of his head. “No, I wouldn’t…”

“Of course not. You’re a superhero now, right?”

He grins. It’s brief, boyish, sheepish. He’s studying the design of your clothes. You consider that progress from your feet.

“You were recommended to me by Dr. Rooney at Belle Reve,” you begin conversationally, baldly, wanting to get a feel of where he was coming from. Your colleague had said Krill was not a violent inmate, but was often verbally bullied by other prisoners. He tended to avoid crowds, thus mostly avoided. More than once he had been on suicide watch. Casually, you glance down at your clipboard. Born in Philadelphia to Augustine Krill--father unknown--and tried and convicted for first-degree murder as an adult in the city of Metropolis. He was incarcerated at Belle Reve shortly after turning eighteen. He was in his early forties now.

You look back up at Abner. He had that sad puppy dog look again, staring at nothing in particular with his neck hunched.

“Did you and Dr. Rooney get along?”

“D-Doesn’t your notes say?”

You make a face. “I want to know what you think of Rooney, not what he thinks.”

Abner didn’t answer right away. “He was okay.”

“Okay,” you echo, licking your bottom lip as you cock your head up. “Okay is better than nothing.”

“We mostly spoke about my mother.”

“Oh?”

“She experimented on me and my siblings. She wanted us to become superheroes,” he said. His voice held much more confidence than anything he’d said so far, but his expression remained unchanged. It was because he kept words void of emotion.

“I see.” Yes, you did see. You had anticipated the topic of his mother coming up if you didn’t ask him about it first in future sessions. Dr Krill was listed in his files as a scientist at S.T.A.R. Labs, and having six children whom lived on site with her. CPC had been called a few times, rebuffed every time by various means other than being convinced nothing was wrong. The whole thing was fishy, especially after the untimely deaths of three of Dr. Krill’s children. The whereabouts of the other Krill children were unknown. All investigations into S.T.A.R. Labs had been terminated by higher powers, even after Abner’s arrest and psychological evaluation.

Abner continues, to your surprise. “I pictured Starro as my mother.”

“You did?”

“It makes it easier, when I convince myself that my enemy is her. I don't like killing.”

You pick up your pen and tap your lip, looking down at the way he was fidgeting his feet. “Did you regret killing your mother”

Abner’s knee stopped bouncing. “No.”

“Do you regret killing the other scientists at S.T.A.R. Labs? The--”

Abner grimaced and brought his hands to his head, tugging on fistfulls of black hair. “I-I didn’t mean--I-I--”

“Hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to answer that today,” you placate with a soft tone, putting down your pen, fingers rubbing along the edge of your clipboard. After a moment of heated silence, you set your things down on the desk and stand up. This makes your patient crumble in on himself, trying to hunch low enough to shield some blow. You smile sadly where he can’t see. “Abner, do you see my poster here? With all the emotions?”

He looks back up, glancing from you to said poster. His attention is answer enough.

“Whatever you feel in this room is valid to you and to me. Not now, but in the future I’d like for you to give me short but detailed descriptions to how you feel on certain things. It's okay to say something you think is taboo or unorthodox. This room doesn't have ears or a head to judge. Do you think you can do that?”

The couch makes no sound as he moves to better see the circle chart of words. Timidly, he nods.

“Great,” you smile sadly and sit back down. “Let’s get back to that later. Today, I’d like to talk about something other than your mother.”

Abner tilts his head. You must be doing something to exceed his expectations, because now he’s looking at you and not at you. “The Corto Maltese mission?”

“No. I want to know about you. I want to talk about Abner Krill. Who are you?”

His blank stare makes your heartache a little for him.

The following silence, where all you can hear is his ragged breath, the whirl of the monitor, and the soft mist of the incense humidifier, is thick. You can cut it with the tip of your pen. The sound of his voice as he speaks is almost staggering. "I am... I am my mother's son."

“No."

He flinches.

"Your mother does not define you. What you think about your mother and how you feel about her should not determine your sense of self or your future. You liked defeating that monster, right?”

Abner nods.

“You’re a superhero because you took action, not because she moved your hand. What you say here today, and any day, should be the same. Do you think you can do this for me?”

“I don’t understand…”

“I want to know the real Abner,” you smile. “Not Dr. Krill’s son.”

He still can’t make eye contact. The fidgeting starts back up. “But, what I am is because of her.”

“Not unless you choose otherwise. Starting today, you and I are going to help define Abner Krill. First, you are not your mother’s son.”

“But I am?”

“No. You are not your mother’s son. You’re Abner Krill, superhero. What does Abner Krill the superhero like to do?”

Understanding slowly started to dawn on him, visible in his eyes as he lifted his slanted brows. Recovering from trauma was no walk in the park, but the two of you had to start somewhere. Rooney over-fixated on Abner’s fixation on his mother and the abuse, and after years of obsessing over it to “fix” him, it seemed to become all Abner could think about. No one had really given him proper trauma recovery therapy, or helped to treat his PTSD. You wanted him to take the first step into self-evolution. No one could do it for him. You want him to define himself other than his mother’s son. Seeing himself as a superhero was perhaps the start of it.

“I-I don’t know,” he frowned. “I like to read…”

“That’s great!” Your enthusiasm startles him. “What sort of things do you like to read?”

“Well… Ah, I-I uh... I like the classics….”

The rest of your session with Abner was mostly casual. The safe topics you steered him to visibly made the man relax. He spoke about the fictional worlds he enjoyed immersing himself in. He liked the classics because they were “soft”. Sweet romances where the only real worries were who’s going to the ball. He didn't like tragedies or novels about war or great violence. With some coaxing, he opens up to talk about his favorite foods, animals, celebrities, songs-- You ask about his (non-virus related) talents or any hobbies he might’ve picked up at the prison or since he’s been out. Steering him away from the topic of his mother confused him in the beginning, leading you to assume he had anticipated mostly speaking about her. He’d been prepared like he might prepare to go into battle.

You know he won’t be able to just brush his mother aside; his virus was because of Dr. Krill. He blamed his 20+ years of incarceration at Belle Reve on his mother’s experimentations. He blamed himself. He hated her. He hated himself. Feared her. Feared himself. It was an inner wound that would never heal, you know this without a doubt, but you hope with time it becomes easier to manage as he takes control and independence of his new life.

“Did you ever go to school, Abner?”

The phantom smile on his face falls, but you haven’t lost him as he turns to you. Looks at your shoulder. “No. We--my siblings and I--were… homeschooled.”

“Right. Well, you at least know what homework is?”

“Yes. Of course. Am--Do you want me to--?”

With a hand gesture you hope is placating, you smile and gently cut him off. “Don’t worry, I’m not assigning you an essay to write or a month-long project to present. I’m not that cruel,” you chuckle. “But I am going to push you a little. Can you try that for me?”

He looks as if you’ve asked him to consider sacrificing his firstborn. Thankfully, he nods as he plucks a loose string off his knee.

“I want to see you biweekly, so schedule with Patrica upfront. Maybe this Friday or Saturday?”

“I-I can do that, yes ma’am.”

"Now, it's your choice to come back or not but it would make me really happy if you did."

His back straightens. "Yes. I'll be here."

“Beautiful, Abner. Beautiful. Sometime this week I’d like you to do something you normally wouldn't do. Go on a hike, join a gym, take a class on cooking or arts and crafts. It can be simply looking up a food recipe you’ve never tried before and making it. Tell me about your experience. If you’re around strangers, how is your relationship with them? If you see something new, how does it make you feel? This isn’t an order, Abner, just a… strong suggestion, mm? All I’m asking is for you to do something new and spontaneous. It can be at home or outside. Your choice.”

Abner licked his lips. It had taken a great deal of effort to convince him to come here at all today. Today is the first time speaking to him, but you’ve had his file for a few days now. You’re a little grateful for that. There was a lot to read. However, it took outside forces such as one Amanda Waller and fellow ex-prisoner teammates to get him to come here. You suspect someone dropped him off if he didn’t take a cab himself. He had no driver's license.

“Ah… Okay. Um, yes miss. Ma'am. Doctor! Ah--”

“You can call me by my name,” you reassure, tilting your head to him. “This is a safe space for you and I. We may be doctor and patient outside that door, but here, we can be as familiar with each other as we'd like. Like old friends.”

He turned to you with a look that sent a thunderbolt of sensation down your spine. Surprise, awe. A silent question gleamed in his puppy-dog eyes. He doesn't respond, brows raised high as he just stares at you.

You cover for his lapse. “I’ll see you in a few days. It was wonderful to finally meet you, Abner,” you say, looking at him without pretenses to hopefully show your honesty. He had an incredible gift that could help save a lot of people, and from what you've learned from recent character evaluations on him he had the makings of a fine superhero. First thing first, he needed to adjust to civilian life after years of being locked up, and years of having nothing but unresolved trauma. All the while, you hold back a rueful smile at his demeanor. You won't say it aloud of course, but he was so cute. Idly, you wonder about his sexuality- but you can ask that another day. For now you wanted him to be a little more daring to try new things and focus on something other than his mother.

You stand up and shake his hand. His grip is a little looser this time, lingering longer, but he moves away quickly, gathers his shoes, and you see him out. His scurrying reminds you of a startled elk. Large yet quick, stumbling over his long legs. Running from you as if you held a rifle instead of a purple glitter clipboard.

It was hard to believe this man had committed mass homicide.

#abner krill #polka dot man #the Suicide squad #abner krill x reader #polkadot man x reader #reader #therapy #chapter one

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snifflesthemouse · 3 years ago

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There's a sense of freedom that comes with anonymity of online interactions. This sense of freedom only exists because of the fact it's difficult for the real world to catch up with you in your real life. Unless of course, you go after the wrong one.

When a person goes after someone else solely because they think differently or have a strong opposing opinion, they often do so with a false gusto and bravery that only exists in the virtual realm. Like many say online, "You'd never say that to my face." And that's true for most people... but not all people.

And because of this anonymity, that affords all internet users the freedom to say whatever, a real life concern spawns from a virtual world. This real life concern is often referred to as "doxxing" where one internet user uses what clues and resources they have available to "expose" another internet user's real life. This has happened to many people I watch on YouTube. Some have even had to involve the real life police, as well as uproot their entire lives and move because of doxxing.

For example, Murky Meg has been doxxed a couple times now. She's had her real life threatened by doxxing. Terrifyingly, she wasn't the only target threatened because the douche flutes also brought her children into it. Yes, the same people who worship the Montecito Madam and preach the mantras of "compassion and kindness" and "leave children out of this" have gone so far as to go after Murky Meg's real life and real life children. And sadly, the threats and attacks never really stop. Especially when articles like the one I wrote about make the rounds. But Murky Meg doesn't allow this all to silence her; she keeps calm and carries on regardless.

Another example involves Yankee Wally. She was targeted repeatedly over copyright infringement on her YouTube channel, as well as having her social media accounts suspended repeatedly over the last few years. And even though Yankee Wally has never pretended to be anything or anyone else than who she is in real life, people have attempted to use her past as a weapon to discredit her. Those attempts are futile, though, because Yankee Wally has always been open and honest about her life. She's also been very clear to the people watching her that she will fight back if need be.

Then there's According2Taz. While Taz has gone through the same ringer that so many others have gone through (from doxxing to threats, harassment, and verbal abuse), she has also been attacked financially. Especially when it comes to her supporting good causes. Some twat waffles have sent her £0.01 via PayPal with notes attached. Notes that are grossly abusive, calling her fat and ugly, and saying her husband is cheating on her. Others have sent requests asking her to pay them £100 with notes attacking HRH Catherine the Duchess of Cambridge and her book. Murky Meg got a similar request, as well. But the most heinous impediment coming from the Montecito Madam's extremists, involved charity. Once, when Taz was raising money for Australian wildlife affected by the wildfires; someone reported her PayPal account and those funds were held up for some time before getting released for the cause. Then, again, Taz was targeted when she was raising funds to help an elderly woman who got robbed. Yes, the very same people, who stand on custom-made soap boxes emblazoned with the Sussex monogram, did everything they possibly could to marginally disrupt charity. Yet Taz does not waiver; she keeps going.

As bad as Murky Meg, Yankee Wally, and Taz have had it, they're sadly not alone. No, they are only three examples from a plethora of examples. Of that plethora, one more example comes to mind. That example involves DanjaZone (Ashli).

Ashli, who started her YouTube channel before the whole Megxit ordeal as a way to keep in touch with family, was even the subject of a blind item from CDAN (crazy days and nights). You see, Ashli and her family lost everything they had in a horrible house fire. Rumors swirled around the fire, but the most heinous comments came from the Sussex Squad's more prominent loudmouths. Some accused Ashli of lying about the fire in an attempt to scam people for money. Others called her white trash and trailer trash. So while Ashli was going through the loss of her home and everything she owned... while she was grieving the loss of family pets and irreplaceable family mementos... while she was down and out on her luck and trying to cope with all the pain and loss... while she was going through all of the attacks from doubters saying she faked the fire or was lying, that she was trailer trash... the disciples of the Duchess were laughing and celebrating her pain as a win. Never once considering the fact that Ashli has been in recovery for years now, and the stress from the fire coupled with the heartless, feckless attacks, could in fact push her over the edge.

No, the very same people, who scream via CAPS lock on social media that critics of Meghan should "leave her alone", that her critics drove the Montecito Madam to "suicidal ideation while pregnant" could care less about Ashli's mental health. Yes, the very same people, who lodged over 50,000 OFCOM complaints against Piers Morgan because he questioned their beloved's outlandish attacks during the Oprah interview, previously found no issues with attacking Ashli during one of the hardest times in her life. Yet, Ashli picked up the pieces and never gave up or gave into their attacks.

Again, these four examples are just the tip of the hypocritical iceberg. There are countless more examples out there. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people who criticize Meghan's and Harry's behaviors can all relate. Nobody is safe or off limits from this iceberg; from Royal Rota reporters, celebrities, and politicians to regular people who aren't rich, famous, or in possession of a global platform.

Yet nobody, and I mean absolutely nobody, in the media or in journalism ever cover any of this. You can find articles galore written with the intentions of exposing "Meghan Markle Haters". Articles like the one I wrote about attacking critics and reducing us all to the stereotypes of racist, misogynist, bigot, envious, etc.

What that does is send a clear, prominent message to the people who cling to every word of the Montecito Madam. The people who cling to the wind coming from her mouth, her "close friends" or fake "palace insiders" hear those dog whistles loud and clear. The dog whistles that say "It's okay, keep attacking and hurting people. They're evil, hateful racists. They deserve the abuse. You're on the side of good. Go harder!"

When in truth, the wind they cling to coming from their beloved's mouth or mouthpieces is actually falsehoods, lies, and manifestations of grandeur that is no more real than Netflix's The Crown. No, the wind they cling to really comes from the south mouth of their beloved. But God forbid anyone hold their little cult accountable.

We cannot have a society where sensationalism trumps truth. We cannot weaponize the press and use it against people simply because they criticize the Meghan Markles of the world. It is unacceptable for the press, media platforms, or anyone with a prominent influence on society, to celebrate defenders of the Meghan Markle faith without first acknowledging the truth.

The truth, which is often dream dashing and harsh, is that "Meghan Markle Lovers" could care less about compassion, kindness, charity, children, or community. The truth is, they could care less about forgiveness or loving thy neighbors. We don't have to look to their savior figurehead to prove this to be true. We only have to look at the comments section or Twitter.

Those of us who criticize or dislike Meghan and Harry because of their behavior know all too well the truth will never be written up on the front page of the Sun, the Daily Mail, or People Magazine. The mirage of us being the racists, misogynists, or detesting haters sells papers. And the papers don't want to be in that same category.

Maybe one day the press will tell the stories of people like Murky Meg, Yankee Wally, Taz, Ashli, and countless others in an effective way that exposes the real haters in the relationship. Maybe one day, the victims of the Montecito Madam's cult following will be doxxed, exposed, and sent a new message. A message that says, "We see you for the hypocrites you are. You may repeat the preachings of your Madam like it's the new woke gospel, but you don't practice it. You're a big reason why people loathe your beloved. You make her look worse. You aren't defending her, you are condemning her. Keep it up, because we see you and we will expose you!"

If only...

#murky meg #yankeewally #according2taz #DanjaZone #megxit

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hopeymchope · 3 years ago

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Wonder Egg Priority finale thoughts

My Tumblr has a lot of anti-bully content, so it was probably no surprise when I began to watch and enjoy Wonder Egg Project this past spring. The series famously hit production delays that forced them to put out a mid-series recap episode, and that decision in turn forced them to push the final episode until late June. But now that the series (or at least season 1) is out there and complete, I thought I’d talk about how it all shook out in the end as well as the questions it left me sitting with.

For the uninitiated, here’s a bit of the context: Wonder Egg Project deals with four middle-school teen girls who’ve undergone hardships either at home or at school or both. They all lose someone they care about to tragic suicides, and then they discover the titular wonder eggs. They get these eggs from a vending machine and then, when they fall asleep, they enter a dreamworld where these eggs hatch to reveal a young person who recently committed suicide. For that night, it is the duty of the girl who got that egg to fight and defend that suicide victim from monstrous enemies that represent their abusers and oppressors. The girls are told that if they protect enough of these victims over many nights, they will be able to resurrect the specific person they lost to suicide. But of course, if you get injured or killed in the dreamworld, it affects your body in reality as well.

The squad: Ai, Neiru, Rika, and Momoe.

Obviously, bullying is among the topics most frequently explored here, but we also deal with so many other terrible things that people might experience during childhood and adolescence. Physical, verbal, and sexual abuse are all on the table. Coming to terms with one’s gender identity is raised. It’s a show that manages to tackle a lot of heavy subjects through the lens of what’s essentially magical girl combat. I mean, there are no outfit transformations or any of that stuff, but still.

With THAT out of the way, let me talk about how the series wrapped up.

It’s clear to the viewers that there’s a lot that doesn’t make sense during the show — it’s intentionally very trippy and ethereal at times — and there’s also a lot that raises obvious questions even if you grasp it. Where do the eggs and their connection to the recently deceased come from? How do the psychological traumas of the various egg-children manifest as monsters that can literally kill you? What’s the deal with Acca and Ura-Acca and their freaky dummy bodies? What are they getting out of this whole deal with the eggs and the girls? What do the repeated references to the “temptation of death” mean? How does access to the Egg Garden even work? Is it really possible to resurrect their dead friends? Is Mr. Sawaki a predator or a chill guy or what? Why did Neiru’s sister stab her? And so on.

The writers could’ve opted to keep things mysterious and hazy and metaphysical for the entire run or they could’ve provided lots of explanations and tried to ground this weird story in some sort of strange logic, but I’m actually pleased that they opted to go down the middle. There are answers for many things, but not for all. And when those answers come, they typically just raise more questions as well as doubts to their validity.

SPOILERS for the finale/”special episode” below the cut.

So, obviously the answers for Acca and Ura-Acca are centered around Frill. Frill is this interesting fusion between the artificial and the organic; her body can be injured like any regular physical body, but she’s actually an A.I. on the inside. Acca and Ura-Acca are the exact reverse of this — they’re human minds inside of completely artificial bodies. Exactly how Frill started invading girls’ minds to lure them towards suicide is kept incredibly vague, but she serves as the embodiment of the “temptation of death” that was so-often referenced in the show. Frill doesn’t really appreciate life or care about the finality of death, making her a pretty natural foe for the heroes who have spent the entire series learning to appreciate their lives and bemoaning painful losses.

Can you even believe this bitch?

Acca and Ura-Acca also have documents talking about how warriors of Eros need to battle against Thanatos, the embodiment of death, but what’s that all about? We don’t really get into it. Is Frill somehow Thanatos herself? I mean... I guess maybe you could go that route, but I sincerely don’t think that’s meant to be the case. I assume she’s just another player in the game, and she happens to have taken Thanatos’ side in things. Her artificial existence and resentment of her fathers leads her to treat death flippantly. She was programmed to be selfish sometimes, and that selfishness has ultimately manifested itself in the worst possible ways. Intriguingly, we see Acca and Ura-Acca act similarly selfish in how they drive our four heroes to risk their lives just to battle Frill. Acca in particular shows that he’ll risk anyone’s life to get to Frill, who killed both his wife and daughter. But Acca never has to risk his own life. He’s just risking other people. Both sides of the equation are treating human lives like disposable pawns in some kind of war game.

Y’all are SUPER-SKETCH.

It’s never really clear how these eggs work. We’re told that the Accas created the eggs, and honestly, I could’ve figured as much on my own. But they don’t try to explain how the eggs can contain the souls of suicide victims or how they manifest those people into dreams, and frankly, it’s probably better not to try.

I was really shocked that the girls actually manage to resurrect their dead friends. I was 100% certain that was going to be a scam and the point was going to be about learning to move on and live for the moment and appreciate those bonds while you had them, etc. And there is some of that. Alas, the price of resurrecting those people they care about is that the people in question no longer know them or remember them. That was pretty brutal... having our heroes nearly die over and over in service of people who ultimately will no longer care about them at all. Although they did the impossible and brought someone back to life, they had to lose those people all over again. I suppose this, like much fo the finale, emphasizes that we should appreciate our relationships while they last, because you can lose them for so many reasons. Regardless, I’m not surprised that Momoe just wanted to quit and avoid getting hurt after that. It’s understandable.

There’s a lot of discussion around parallels in the last two episodes. Parallel worlds with alternate versions of the self are raised multiple times, Ai gets an awesome encounter with a parallel version of herself that really brought her emotional journey to a head, and we even have to deal with a doppleganger of Neiru at the end. This leads to the revelation that Neiru looks exactly like her formerly deceased sister... a fact that presumably was part of what drove the sister to attack Neiru in the first place. Given that we’ve already been told that they were both genetically engineered, their identical appearances don’ seem that strange. But then the finale tells us that Neiru’s one dream is “to be human,” and suddenly the characters assume Neiru was an A.I. just like Frill. That... seems like a leap to me. I mean, she was genetically engineered to lead her company and never had a family of her own; no wonder she feels inhuman! So I’m not sure if I should take this at face value.

Neiru real or fake challenge

Another thing that I don’t think we can take at face value is Mr. Sawaki’s explanation of Koito’s death. In episode 12, we meet a parallel version of Ai who actually killed herself. The big boss monster for Ai to fight while protecting Alt-Ai? It’s a dark, abusive version of Sawaki. And our Ai inexplicably assumes this monster was made from her own fears. A very bizarre conclusion to jump to when you remember that every single boss monster has been the abuser of the victim that the girls were defending in that episode. By all available evidence, the Sawaki monster should be a parallel-world Sawaki who is very much exactly the scumbag he appears to be! Notice how Alt-Ai never says a damn word about the Sawaki Monster - never asks who he is or why he’s like this, etc? She’s not even surprised. That just lends further credence to my belief. FOLLOW THE EVIDENCE.

So in the finale, when our version of Mr. Sawaki claims (via a VERY awkwardly inserted voiceover) that Koito’s death was an accident after she tried to ruin his reputation because she fell in love with him, why should I believe any of it?! The previous episode introduced me to Abusive Sawaki! Sure, we don’t have any reason to assume our Sawaki is That Dick, but we JUST learned that he’s certainly capable. Furthermore, how could Koito suddenly be the ONLY accidental death among all of the available suicide victims in the dreamworld? She shouldn’t have even appeared there if it was just an accident! Although I’d like to believe that Sawaki was someone who Ai and the girls were jumping to conclusions about based on nothing... but it sure doesn’t look that way from here. And given how the show ends things, I fear we may have a hard time learning anything else about Sawaki. Ai changes schools and runs away, there is zero comment on what happened to Sawaki’s relationship with her mom... he’s just gone now.

As the final episode winds down, we see Rika and Ai fall back into bad habits, as they all treat Neiru just like they treated the girls they tried so hard to save. Rika acts disgusted by a friend and abandons her, treating Neiru the same way she treated Cheimi. When Neiru finally reaches out to Ai and calls her, Ai ignores the call and throws her phone away, thereby ignoring her friend’s needs in the same way she ignored Koito’s when she failed to record the bullying Koito was experiencing. You might even be able to connect Momoe’s choice to walk away for the sake of self-preservation to her decision to reject Haruka and walk away, honestly. And to compound the bad news that the show gives us near the end, we skip forward months to learn that Ai, Rika and Momoe have all drifted apart. Ai is in a new school, but we don’t see her with any new friends. She’s back where she started the show.

The difference, however, is that she doesn’t seem hopeless and lonely. She seems wistful, sure, but she never seems beaten down. She still treasures the friendships she built even if they wind up fading away. So there’s still a message in here about moving on, because even if you lose a person or a connection, it will forever matter.

*insert engine rev-up noises*

In the final moments, we see Ai preparing to run in the exact same pose she used back in episode 1 when she first stood up to the abusers within the dreamworld. This time, she runs to grab her chance to reunite with a dear friend. She takes charge of her own future and her own self-worth, somehow gets back into the Egg Garden (even though Rika wasn’t even allowed to enter after she rescued her specified victim, so uh... how did Ai get back in exactly... ?), and insists she’s going to use the eggs to see Neiru... even though the eggs only let you see the dead up to this point, so uh, that doesn’t really make any sense either. Consistency, motherfucker — DO YOU USE IT?

Amidst all the uncertainty that the finale left us with, at least we can see Ai find herself in a more confident place. She spends much of the series learning to stop running from her problems in the real world. Even after she gains confidence in the battles of her dreams, she struggles to face reality. It’s a huge step when she returns to school. Yet even in the very last episode, she opts to run away to a new school rather than cope with seeing Koito each day. But at last, she decides to take charge of her reality and try to reunite with her new best friend, Neiru. She’s wavered on her path, but ultimately, she’s grown. Although you could simultaneously argue that she’s failing to learn the lesson that rescuing Koito should’ve taught her...

“Ai Ohto is BACK!”

I don’t think any of us expected this finale to be a cliffhanger coming into it. And unfortunately, we don’t know if there will ever be another season or a movie or anything. Given how people reacted to this finale with such overt hate, I really don’t expect anything more. And I think that would be a goddamn shame. Even with a finale that doesn’t quite stick the landing, I still found it fascinating and engaging. The series is more than worth the trip for the characters, for the themes and topics it explores, and even for the fluid action scenes and music. And this is a series that was made by first-time writers and a first-time director! Yet I’d easily call it one of the best animes from the past couple of years. For total newcomers, that’s a goddamn TRIUMPH.

So I hope we reunite with these girls again. I hope Ai manages to get the band back together, find out exactly what’s going on with Neiru, and face down Frill. Even if they never wind up in some ultimate battle with Thanatos, I don’t know that that’s the point. All of us are in a battle with Thanatos every single day, after all. They just need to show how they’ve all gotten stronger together and truly overcome the “Temptation of Death” by beating back Frill (and her ridiculously powerful dreamworld bug-people) as a unit.

But maybe that’s too obvious and simplistic of a message for a show like this one. Maybe this complex ending centered on the main protagonist’s self-actualization and the value of fleeing relationships is more in keeping with the melancholy nature of the series.

... I still really want to see the more obvious happy ending, though. I think they deserve it.

#wonder egg priority #ai ohto #wep #anime #anime reviews #wonder egg special episode #wonder egg priority special episode #wonder egg priority finale #wonder egg finale #wonder egg

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johannas-motivational-insults · 4 years ago

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So I don’t mean this argumentatively, I’m just genuinely confused & would like to understand this. I also struggle with empathy & take things very literally, so that could be part of why I’m not understanding. But where is Catra shown to be empathetic or compassionate? I understand that her abuse informs a lot of her actions and that’s why she is impulsive, lies, and manipulates others in the earlier seasons- they’re survival tactics that she got from SW + growing up in the Horde.

But I didn’t notice her going out of her way for others unless it could also benefit her in some way. I’ve also seen people say that she died in the process of sending Glimmer to Adora, & therefore deserves redemption because she made the ultimate sacrifice, only to then be saved and effectively made to work on her behavior and become a better person. And that would be all well & good, except we don’t really see her working on her behavior, except in the scene where she’s telling Adora that she’s working on her anger, and in the scene where she asks her to stay. I’m also not sure that she actually died, though I have heard a lot of people saying that. And I get that it’s called a redemption arc for a reason, & that the implication is that she will continue to work on her behavior and be better, but I just don’t know that we saw enough of that in the show.

So the thing with Catra is that a lot of this is pretty subtle. And as I said in the other ask that I assume you’re referring to with this, she’s often driven by a mix of selfish and unselfish motives. You’re correct that a lot of the times she does things for other people could also be seen as selfish moves because there’s something in it for her too, but that’s not always true and even when it is it doesn’t mean that that empathy or care for other people isn’t there.

Some examples of times when she shows empathy/care for others while also helping herself:

Gives Adora the sword so she and Glimmer can escape in 1x09, which is a kindness to Adora but also allows Catra to keep her job and her power (even if it breaks her heart to give up on bringing Adora back)

Warns Entrapta to stay out of Hordak’s sanctum and chases Entrapta down when she defies her in 2x03, which seems to be a mix of not wanting to deal with an angry Hordak herself and protecting a rather oblivious Entrapta from getting into trouble

(Note that in both of these examples she does this in a rather brusque or mean way, hiding her concern, but the subtext is there if you watch closely)

However, there are also many instances where Catra helps other people despite there not only being nothing in it for her, but when it’s actually against her own interests. Here’s the ones I can think of off the top of my head (but I’m sure there’s more):

Lies about Adora’s whereabouts and then her identity as She-Ra early in season 1 to protect her from the Horde, even after she’s promoted to Force Captain, which is dangerous not only to her career but to her life and limb

Tries to comfort her abuser Shadow Weaver when she sees her in distress in 1x04 and 1x10, the former instance right after Shadow Weaver gears up to attack her and "drag the truth” from her mind (anyone less empathetic would run away or even gloat)

Brings Shadow Weaver her old badge in 2x06 as a final favor when SW is about to be shipped away for good, despite it possibly being something that could get her in trouble and there being nothing in it for her (and in fact if she’s as selfish and callous as some say she’d deny SW this closure out of spite)

Turns down Scorpia’s offer to break her out of prison in 3x01, which seems to be entirely for Scorpia’s benefit as Catra has nothing to lose at this point (people just don’t see the compassion in this because she drives Scorpia away in a mean way to ensure she actually leaves)

Doesn’t tell Hordak that Scorpia “broke the recordings” that were inside Emily in 4x06, lies and says there was nothing, which turns Hordak’s anger on her instead of Scorpia (this perhaps is also motivated by guilt over how she just yelled at Scorpia and said awful things to her -- like I said, Catra is complicated -- but alleviating her guilt doesn’t help her situation at all so that’s borderline)

If you want, there’s a whole tweet thread of instances of Catra showing care and empathy for others. Some of these are weaker than others and the list may not be complete, but they’re all there for your consideration.

In addition to the things she does for other people, a lot of this is in her body language. If you really watch Catra, you can see that being cruel does not come naturally to her and she feels conflicted about a lot of her choices (or is straight up haunted by them, like her nightmare about betraying Entrapta in 4x03). Likewise, you often see her expression soften when she sees someone in distress. There are so many examples, it’s something baked into her character and it’s evident throughout the show, even when she’s at her lowest. But I think people often miss these moments because she usually shoves that initial reaction down and reacts in a way that on paper just makes her look like a cruel villain. For instance, she has a particularly guilt-stricken moment in 4x12 when Kyle calls her out for treating her old squad badly before she reacts by shoving that guilt down and reasserting her power, as that’s the only thing protecting her.

You have to understand that Catra was taught both implicitly and explicitly that compassion and vulnerability are weaknesses. And throughout the show, oftentimes when she does open up or do something for someone else it results in her being hurt/betrayed. Shadow Weaver in 2x06 and Double Trouble in 4x13 teach her that trusting people and allowing them in is dangerous and only ends in pain and devastation (and with Shadow Weaver, it teaches her the same lesson about showing mercy). When she spirals into her homocidal/suicidal breakdown starting in 3x03 it’s because she finds out Shadow Weaver left her to join the rebellion, just like Adora, and that Bright Moon is now harboring her abuser (as she understands it). Thing is, that all happens just as she’s starting to open up to and actually befriend Scorpia, and even though Scorpia isn’t the one who hurt her it still reinforces that pattern that vulnerability and kindness comes before a horrible, life-shattering event. Because of all this, she hides the empathy and kindness intrinsic to her actual character under layers of power and cruelty to protect her broken heart from being hurt again and protect herself from getting removed from power, because that’s the only thing keeping her from becoming someone’s abuse victim again after so many years suffering under Shadow Weaver’s heel.

I totally hear you about wishing there was a bit more to Catra’s redemption arc, but much like the rest of her emotional arc a lot of it is implicit. I’m very glad they added that one moment where she talks about working on her anger as well as her mini arc with Perfuma in 5x10 that culminated in Perfuma’s speech about learning to be vulnerable so you can be happy. But there’s lots of smaller moments buried in the season too, where we see her conflicted and struggling with these impulses of protecting herself vs. opening up or showing kindness. I mean, her half of 5x06 was basically about that too, though that’s only the beginning of this journey. Having Melog around was great too because they not only mirror her emotions for the audience to see but also help her process said emotions. Basically, the redemption is a process for her and a lot of it is not super explicit but in the end I think we have all we need to understand who Catra really is and that she wants to do better and is going to continue to in the future.

Really, Catra’s redemption arc is not so much about making up for what she did (which I and many others wish there was more of but oh well) as it is about rediscovering her true self and honoring that, learning to be vulnerable and kind again. In the end, her willingness to open herself up to potential rejection and loss and her kindness and love motivating her to help Adora get to the Heart and complete her mission are what ended up saving the universe, and that was a very intentional choice by the creators. Catra’s journey is not about coming back to Adora, it’s about coming back to herself, and I think that’s beautiful.

#spop #she-ra #she ra #catra #catrademption #redemption arc #catradora #abuse survivor psychology #asks #anon

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justasimplesinner · 4 years ago

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How about Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, Killer Croc and El Diablo with a new member of the suicide squad who is one of the most dangerous metahuman in the world ? What the squad know is the metahuman destroyed half of a city with their powers. And they are wearing a somekind of colar to keep the powers under control.

this was supposed to be fun but it started turning into some hardcore hurt/comfort bullshit

Harley Quinn with a metahuman s/o hcs:

oh darlin', you and her instantly clicked together. bonded the moment you saw each other. after all, it takes one to know one

she will absolutely bombard you with questions. and yes, some of them will inquire about exactly how you killed some people that tried to stop you. she wants to know all the spicy details about you and your little escapade that ended in destroying half of a Gotham-sized city

if it all came from some unresolved issues, then she will gladly help you out with those - she may have lost her license, but she didn't lose the experience. she's still a great psychiatrist. and then, you two will be able to wreck havoc just because you want to, not because of some twisted form of grief/revenge or whatever

she's basically attached to you at the hip, and often gloats about you. she will threaten people who wronged her with you and what would you do to them. more than once you've brutally forced people to apologize for ever disrespecting your lady love

but despite the whole "causing chaos wherever you two go" thing, your relationship is really healthy. you both have respect for each other, and Harley would never use you as a weapon or anything of the sort. she finally has a loving partner that doesn't treat her like shit, she is not going to ruin that

Captain Boomerang with a metahuman s/o hcs:

oh, he'd tease you. a lot. some of it bordering on plain out bullying. everything just to get a reaction from you, preferably see you break free of that collar and show what you got. he really doesn't know other ways to get attention from you

it sounds weird, but he appreciates the fact that everything you did, you did for your own gain and never intentionally hurt any civilians. because you might be the person to finally understand him instead of just labeling him as criminal scum (he still is scum tho)

you can bet your ass he will try to use you to his advantage to get away. and at first, he bothered with you purely out of your usefulness, but the more he talked to you, the more he realized how much you two are alike, how well you get a long and how much he loves your banters. so, in the end, it's not as much using you as forming a plan with you to get away safely and have some fun together

is very playful about the collar, makes a fuckton references to sexual activities or just keeping you on a leash. he just can't help himself

you two make a terrifyingly great duo, and if it wasn't for his recklessnes and your occassional emotional outbursts, you'd never get caught. but oh well, mistakes happen. and just because you're in prison doesn't mean you won't have some fun together. no prison cell can hold you for long, and if you're out, he's out

Killer Croc with a metahuman s/o hcs:

at first, none of you approached the other. he even kind of wanted to, but he's more of a silent observer than the person taking initative. so in the beginning, he really made no effort to talk to you. until one time you saved his ass, and he helped you save yours

even that wasn't a long conversation, just a few words thrown in here and there. but the more he knew about you, the more he gravitated towards you and started approaching you, tried to talk to you. of course, there were still doubts in his head, he berated himself for even bothering at times, but he made the effort

soon enough though, he realized that all his hesitation was for nothing. you turned out to be very... welcoming of his presence. you never looked at him weirdly or pushed him away. you knew how it was to be the outcast, alienated from society and that's what brought you two really close - similar experiences and bonding over them

he understands why you did what you did. he understands how you felt, why you suddenly blew up to take revenge on everyone who wronged you, to let out all that rage at the injustice, at how you were treated your whole life. it didn't bring the katharsis you hoped for, obviously, but it made you understand that there's no place for people like you and him in the world. the thing was, now you didn't have to be alone

the fact that you now have each other makes life more... bearable. because you both have something to look forward to. you both can love and be loved. you found solace in each other, you finally found... happiness

El Diablo with a metahuman s/o hcs:

Diablo never planned to even speak to you. he thought of you as another sick fuck who killed people for fun. until he saw how much other's teasing was getting to you. how much you didn't want to talk about what happened. how much you tried to stay away from the group, knowing you couldn't control yourself around others if they continued to treat you that way

he approached you calmly, almost casually. he offered some small comfort, assuring you not to worry. and when you confessed that you simply didn't want to hurt anyone else... he understood. he fucking knew that so well. and so, he decided to stick around. just to see where it leads

suddenly he found himself caring about you. wanting to assure you you don't have to be scared around him. that you wouldn't hurt him. that everything is okay. he was doing everything that he knew you needed and offered everything he was never offered. he couldn't change his life, but maybe he could help you out with changing yours

he trusted you easily, which was a big surprise. but you two were really the same. one of a kind. you understood him and he understood you, and you bonded over that. and soon, you two found the feeling of comfort in each other, you didn't have to hold anything back and could be yourselves, which was more than any of you ever hoped for

not so long after, you formed an unbreakable bond and whenever the world was just too much to handle, you could always seek out one another and things suddenly seemed fine. he helped you make peace with your past, and you helped you make peace with his, and for the first time since forever, Diablo felt that inner calmness that only you could bring

#harley quinn #harleen quinzel #waylon jones #killer croc #captain boomerang #digger harkness #george digger harkness #el diablo #chato santana #my writing #headcannons #fluff #angst #hurt/comfort #anonymous

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stilemawillow · 4 years ago

Text

Romantic? More Like NO [Levi | Reader]

Prequel: Fairy Tale NOT Like

"Levi, I really am irritated right now." Hearing her voice from the female showers made him just as irritated because she might’ve been pretty but she had no tact and it was too early for him to get another headache.

"As if I don't fucking know that already. I'm irritated, too." He was leaning on the wall next to the door and leaning slightly to the side would expose her whole body to his eyes but it was a thing he - one, shouldn’t do and two, wasn’t interested in doing. He’d be lucky if Mikasa Ackerman didn’t show up for her early shower because if he were to be seen waiting on a grown-ass unknown woman by the door, he’d quickly go from Humanity’s Strongest Soldier to Humanity’s Biggest Pervert.

"You're not the one having to play a ninja around an army's headquarters." She snapped from the inside.

"Yes, but I'm the one who has to play the stupid ninja’s bodyguard around the headquarters of the army I'm supposed to be second-in-command in." He hissed in return, listening to the slowly decreasing sound of water hitting the floor.

"Just tell me one thing." The warmth was first, then he turned his head and the tip of his nose almost bumped into hers. Pupils dilating in surprise, his orbs followed the droplets rolling over her skin but his corssed arms stood ridig as if glued to his chest. "What am I going to wear now?" Her sweet voice was laced with fake innocence but her lips wore a small smirk. He snorted but kept quiet. "You're not going to give me any of your clothes, are you now?"

The situation was so messed up right now.

After he’d brought her the coffee, Levi had hastened to point out her stink and immediately after force her into the showers, dismissing her concerns on what she’d wear afterwards by telling her he had a plan. He, in actual fact, had not even an inkling of a plan. Every option he could think of was either humiliating, incriminating or straight-up perverted.

If he gave her his clothes and they were seen together, there would be assumptions. Her dress was already with the piles of laundry that would be washed today, stealing somebody else’s clothes was plain ridiculous, asking another female cadet for an outfit would lead to even more assumptions and making her sneak around the HQ in nothing but a towel was a scene out of a book Hanji would write. He considered finding clothes for her on his own but leaving her alone was too risky. And since the showers would start filling up soon, he had no choice but to take her with him.

"You're going to wear something. Follow me and be quiet." He ordered, heading down the hallway and looking around every time a sound erupted from a room. It could’ve been a snore, the shuffle of clothes or a blanket - it didn’t matter because Levi was paranoid. Then his heel made an unstable plank creak in the silent space and he mentally shat himself.

He was supposed to be a soldier, a former thug, flexibe and agile, and strong, but no--- he couldn’t even walk without making the floor creak like it would break. He held back a groan and resumed walking only to feel something pulling him back by the wrist. (Y/N)’s determined expression faced him the moment he turned back. He awaited her words with a thinning patience. They were making progress and she just had to stop him for God knows what.

"You do know that even if people see us together they wouldn't speak, right?" Her question - naive, stupid and anything but reasonable, made him want to facepalm against the wall.

"And how does that help us?” He frowned. They were so close to the staircase. Why did she have to stop and ask stupid questions?

"All I'm saying is you can make anybody who sees us keep their mouth shut.” She reasoned, making his brow twitch in annoyance. His voice, however, managed to stay quiet.

"It's not that easy."

"Because they’d talk about it behind your back?"

"This isn't even a---" His voice grew in volume as his patience ran out but his incoming outburst was quickly cut off by a muffled voice coming from behind the door they were standing next to.

"Armin, did you hear that?"

"Fucking shit." Levi cursed under his breath, exchanging a panicked look with (Y/N). That was Jean Kirstein’s voice. His brain went into overdrive - they couldn’t run up the stairs, couldn’t wait to be caught here either.

He grabbed her wrist and pulled her to the other side of the narrow hallway into the first room he saw, which was seemingly the last one in row. He hastily opened the door, gripping (Y/N) and feeling his heart on its way to burst. He wouldn’t allow to be caught with a half-naked woman by his own squad.

He heard her call his name as the door was shut - she was pressed against the wall, feeling her towel slip. She held her breath and the fabric fell to the floor, except she couldn’t pick it up since one of her hands was captive and the other was the only thing holding her upright and quiet. The raven-haired man was staring at the door but he would look at her sooner or later.

"I think I heard someone." Armin's voice sounded as he exited the room and looked around, three pairs of footsteps following close behind. (Y/N) couldn’t tell Levi not to turn - a whisper could ruin everything. So she’d keep quiet because the raven seeing her naked in the dark was better than them being found.

"Berthold, do you see anyone?" A masculine voice was heard, one that Levi recognised as Reiner Braun's.

"It's too early for this Reiner." Berthold stated quietly, probably trying not to wake the other cadets.

"I bet I heard someone, guys." Jean's voice sounded next and Levi knew he was fucking doomed. Four damn cadets were going to find him in a closet with a half-naked woman - great.

"Maybe the girls were just heading to the shower."

Levi turned around and his eyes widened. He could hear (Y/N) gulp, then he drew a sharp breath and bit back every vocal reaction which came to mind.

"Maybe we can get to see Mikasa today."

Realising that he’d been stopping her from covering herself, the male let go of her wrist and watched her shakily cover her breasts as her free hand began blindly searching for her towel.

"As if. Come on, Jean. If she doesn't kill you, Eren will try."

The cadets’ conversation was white noise to his ears, his eyes couldn’t leave (Y/N)’s body and his ears could only hear his blood rushing around his body at the sight.

"And maybe after that Corporal Levi will end you completely."

He caught the sound of his name but paid no attention to it, fixed on the woman who finally found the towel and attempted to hide herself. Only then did it occur to him his gaze brought her discomfort. He faced the other way quickly, momentarily stunned by his own rudeness.

"Why would the Corporal even care?"

He heard an almost audible sigh come from her lips once she was covered so he turned, watching her hands grip the upper part of the towel as her gaze avoided his eyes at all cost. Her previous confidence was nowhere to be found.

"He is in charge of Eren after all. If Eren ends up getting hurt during the fight, both the Corporal and Mikasa will beat you up. He's obliged to do it, while Mikasa..."

"Is Mikasa."

"Anyways, let's stop talking about this. Do you know the time?"

"We have time before breakfast."

"But the Corporal will punish us if we end up sleeping in."

"I’m with Berthold, let's go for the showers."

"No, we better sleep a little more."

He made a step in her direction, to which she tried to retract and her foot hit something which then dropped to the side with a loud clangour. Fucking bucket. (Y/N) looked at Levi like a deer in headlights and he, despite his stoic persona, related the same panic she did. He cursed under his breath.

"Did you all hear that?" Jean's startled voice reached their ears as they stood motionless as possible in the closet, fearful of doing as much as breathing.

"Is there an intruder?"

"Jean, come on. Who would sneak into the headquarters? They must be crazy or stupid. The Commander would make Corporal kill them or something." Reiner said and (Y/N) eyed Levi.

"Not knowing the Corporal and being stupid are vastly different - one is called being uninformed." Jean argued, much to Reiner’s dismay.

"And the other is called being crazy. Now let's just go to the showers."

(Y/N) was about to stifle a giggle when Levi’s reflexes acted - knowing when something wouldn’t go as planned. His hand covered her mouth and she held in a yelp as her balance was knocked off and her back hit the wall with a thud.

"Okay, I definitely heard that one! Is someone pranking us?" Jean's voice grew in pitch and volume, meaning he was approaching the closet.

"Jean, what’s all the fuss about?" Another voice (Y/N) didn’t recognise joined the conversation, to which she glanced at Levi in confusion, mouth still covered by his cold hand.

"The suicidal bastard was freed from his cell." Jean's mocking remark almost made (Y/N) snort.

"Hanji came to unlock me for showers and breakfast." The other voice responded just when (Y/N) picked up the unmistakable speech of her hyperactive friend. She felt herself tensing alongside Levi.

"Hello, kiddos! What's up?" Hanji greeted, to which Jean had an immediate reply.

"I heard a sound---"

"Jean is being delusional." Reiner cut off, setting the other boy off.

"No, I definitely heard something! Someone is sneaking around!"

"Who do you think is sneaking around the headquarters?" Hanji questioned curiously, clearly doubting the cadet’s accusations.

"I don't know! Probably a cadet who went to town. They do it often." Jean tried to reason with Hanji and the others, but they weren't ready to accept his seemingly delusional point of view yet.

"I know people do that, Jean. I do it to meet up with (Y/N) and the plank in front of Erwin’s office always creaks." The mad scientist complained and Levi made a mental note about Hanji sneaking out. And about the creaky plank. Armin and Eren went on to ask who (Y/N) was, which just prompted Hanji to rant. “An old friend of mine. She's extremely sweet! And such an eye-candy! Levi couldn't get his eyes off her yesterday!"

Levi couldn't get his eyes off her now either, but he wasn't going to let that information become public knowledge. He was sure she’d sensed it too - the sexual tension drowned by the panic and anticipation they felt.

"Corporal couldn't what?" Eren sputtered, almost choking in shock.

"What was Corporal Levi doing with (Y/N) yesterday?" Armin's voice rang, announcing to (Y/N) and Levi the erasure of Hanji’s brain-to-mouth filter.

"Oh, we went to that ball Eren was whining about! It was fun, Levi took (Y/N) as his escort, he had a suit, flowers and everything!" Levi would’ve facepalmed if possible, whereas (Y/N)’s discomfort grew to the point she contemplated giving his handsome face a slap and walking out of the closet. It would ruin only his reputation either way - but that was the problem.

The whole Survey Corps would suffer if their most valuable member was caught breaking the rules. His authority normally prevented people from badmouthing him but even that wouldn’t save him if rumours of him having a lover got out. It was something (Y/N) couldn’t allow - besides being interesting to her, he was also willing to land her a job.

"And what happened then?" The question derailed her train of thought and she was back in the dark closet, painfully pressed against the wall. She tried to change that by moving just a little and that was when the old forgotten bucket came back into play.

"Oh, well, Levi---"

(Y/N) gasped as her mouth was released and her foot slipped on the bucket - then Levi’s fast reflexes saved them a very painful fall by pushing their bodies back against the wall, except it cost them their low profile.

"Okay, that's it! Now everyone heard that one, right?!" Jean's voice echoed as the others shuffled about.

"You weren't lying after all." Hanji’s statement was heard over the shameful admittances of the other cadets confirming they’d finally heard it themselves.

"Is there someone... in that closet?" The words that exited Berthold's mouth made (Y/N)'s eyes fill with fear. Levi’s composure was also slowly starting to leave him.

"You know the only way to understand."

"Rock, paper, scissors - loser opens the door?"

Besides his composure, his self-respect evaporated at his own squad’s stupidity. He felt more humiliated listening to their problem-solving tactics than imagining himself getting caught with a half-naked woman in a closet. A few seconds of silence later, a small sigh left somebody’s lips, to which the duo in the closet exchanged worried glances.

"Armin, go for it." A voice was heard and said blond sighed again before asking:

"Why do I even have to---"

"Just do it." Jean insisted and the others hummed in agreement.

"You won't die."

"On three." Hanji announced.

Armin’s steps approaching the closet were heard. (Y/N) felt her heart was about to burst and Levi could already picture decades of reputation crumbling to the ground. Years of being a cold-hearted ass with a deadpan, years of fear and respect and not an ounce of regret.

"One..."

The woman met his gaze, feeling his fingers twitch in the slighest over her waist. She mouthed a small apology and he shook his head. He wanted to blame her for everything but he couldn’t stoop that low.

"Two..."

Her fingers were digging into his rigid shoulders when he closed his eyes. He didn’t want to look.

"... three!"

There was the opening of a door. Nobody was saying anything---

Thud.

Crash!

Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

"Shit! That scared me." Jean's voice was just as muffled. Levi slowly opened his eyes to witness the confusion on (Y/N)’s face in the dark.

"It was just a racoon." At Armin’s statement, both their heads whipped back to look at the closed door with wide eyes.

"Mystery solved. At least Jean hasn't gone delusional yet." Hanji mocked cordially, making said boy give an exclamation of indignation. Everybody else was chuckling and (Y/N) and Levi hadn’t begun getting over their shock.

"Now let's go to the showers."

"Okay, okay."

"I'm going to visit Erwin. See you at breakfast, kiddos!" Hanji was off, her footsteps fading up the stairs.

"How did that racoon even get in there?" The boys discussed, voices dropping.

"I don't have an idea..."

Once their footsteps had faded down the hallway, Levi let go of (Y/N), deciding it was safe for them to go out. He dusted himself off and slowly opened the door.

"That was a close call." (Y/N)'s words made him sigh as they slipped back into the empty hallway. He noticed her voice had a sweet ring to it when she was nervous.

"Tell me about it." He snorted and observed the open door of the other closet, right next to their hiding spot.

"I'm sorry about that." Her apology was mumbled in mild shame as he clicked his tongue.

"I raised my voice. Whatever, let's just go." She followed him up the stairs, noting their luck and making him hum along in agreement - it was something he’d never know had made her knees feel like jelly. To her next question of what they would do now, he had an answer at the ready. "I'm bringing you to my office. We dress you up and send you off to town." There was a pause on her end, then a ‘why’ Levi considered rather stupid. "Because you can't stay here."

"Did you forget why you brought me here yesterday?" Her inquiry made him frown but it was just so it wouldn’t betray his ‘oh shit’ face. "Maybe because I had no home at the time?" She pressed further, making him curse as he turned to face her. “You did forget.” Her blunt statement made him snort, rolling his eyes and deciding to play it cool.

"And what of that?" He asked, annoyed and with his arms crossed.

"Well, it intervenes with your plan. And you promised me a job. I can find myself a place to stay but it won’t happen fast, so I’m sorry for being insolent but I’m going to hold you to your word.” Hands on her hips, she was glaring and he avoided looking anywhere but her eyes. She was right and he knew it.

"Let's just go to my office. Discussing this in the middle of the hallway is no good." He commented with a click of his tongue, watching her lips purse as her eyes narrowed. However, she still complied. They passed Erwin’s office, tactfully avoiding the creaky plank and soundlessly slipping in his office. A sigh left his lips as he locked the door.

"Now. You’ll need a plan." (Y/N)'s serious voice helped him shake off the relief he felt. He rolled his eyes, annoyance brimming. He wanted to avoid thinking of a new plan, and the complications that would surely come with it.

"You still need clothes, so we'll find you some. And after that...” He trailed off, making her eyebrow quirk as she waited for his brain to think of the best course of action. “I suppose I’ve got only one choice.” He concluded with a sigh, leaning back against his desk and contemplating. Rumours could spread but it was the only way to keep his word whilst creating the least misunderstandings. “I have to introduce you to everybody.”

"Ready?"

"Never been, never going to be. Let's just do this." Her statement evoked a snort from him as he suppressed the chuckle at the back of his throat. She seemed more nervous than him and it was amusing to say the least. Still, he held out on giving her advice on how to fix it because something told him she wouldn’t manage either way.

The raven-haired male entered the mess hall and she walked at his side; suddenly there were gazes on them, on the baggy clothes she wore that kind of looked to be his size, and whispers slithering round the room. He ignored everything and approached his squad’s table, sitting down and watching before him his usual cup of tea whilst his squad stared at him in bewilderment.

"Uh, Corporal Levi... who is she?" Eren’s hesitant question made Levi glare at the brunet - he was a tad bit anxious but he needn’t admonish his subordinates verbally because of it.

"I'm a friend of Levi's. (Y/N), nice to meet you all." The woman flashed them a smile and voiced a casual introduction before Levi could even begin to speak. He wouldn’t, however, get angry at her, she seemed to be doing well.

"Corporal, I made your tea, it's a bit cold, but---"

"It's fine, Eren." Levi cut him off, taking a sip from mentioned beverage and sighing. So far so good. He briefly glanced at the superiors’ table where he usually sat, finding his Commander’s insistent gaze on him. He wanted to avoid everybody who knew (Y/N) but an encounter was inevitable so he was only stalling even though he was well aware Hanji had already seen them walk in and had probably informed Erwin and Mike of their presence.

"So, Corporal, how did the ball go yesterday?" Mikasa asked boredly while Eren pouted on her left, disappointed still that he hadn’t been invited. Levi and (Y/N) exchanged an alarmed look but neither gave out their concern. The Corporal looked back at his squad: Jean and Eren were impatient to hear his answer, Mikasa was quiet as per usual, Armin was silently observing, Connie and Sasha were gorging on their food and Ymir and Christa were whispering of other topics.

"Not that it's your business but it was shitty. Eren, you can stop whining about not getting invited, it wasn’t worth it either way." The raven took a sip from his cup, watching the four reactions his words caused. Eren’s face dropped as he dismissed his frustration on the matter, Mikasa visibly became suspicious and Armin’s gaze grew uneasy due to the fact he might’ve already pieced everything together and, finally, (Y/N) snorted with laughter and coughed to cover it up. “What seems to be so funny?” Levi faced her with a scowl.

“That was a complete lie, sir. You almost got drunk, you watched an eating contest and you were hit on multiple times by gorgeous noble ladies. I'm afraid you liked your night out. " (Y/N) explained with a smirk, making Jean and Eren gape as Mikasa and Armin's eyebrows raised to the tops of their foreheads. He glared at (Y/N), noting how she’d omitted to mention herself during the story she told - it was something that ticked him off. And he had no idea why.

"Not like you're one to talk - you did get drunk, you fainted, you danced terribly and about half the males in the hall were undressing you with their eyes." He retorted and she looked at him, visibly surprised, while his subordinates curiously observed their exchange.

"Was that a subtle compliment or just a horrible attempt at an insult?" She asked with a terribly attractive smirk, which wasn't good for his moody insides as of lately. His stomach did loops at random ever since he met her, his heart would sometimes skip a beat and his skin would get irritatingly itchy when she touched him. He couldn’t go on to think normally, an image of her smile always had to interrupt him and it was fucking annoying - this whole thing.

"Neither - it's summing up your night there." He clicked his tongue and watched her smile - exactly the thing he didn’t need after the kind of inner monologue he had.

"Whatever it is, I don't mind it. Although I must thank you for making my night so nice." She added at the end, making his eyes narrow. (Y/N) bit her bottom lip to stop herself from grinning, but it was inevitable and the fact she tried to hide it put Levi at a loss for words. Staring at her face and her eyes there was hardly anything for him to think besides:

Fuck, I think I want to kiss this woman right now. His eyes widened at the notion and his rational mind slapped him so hard he suppressed the urge to turn his head to the side in reality. Instead, he only shook it and cursed himself multiple times while sipping on his tea.

"I've done nothing deserving of your gratitude." Levi mumbled in a cold voice once having calmed down while (Y/N) only smiled at him, this time without saying anything.

He wondered whether he’d actually taken a liking to a woman he met just the night before. He knew nothing of her yet he couldn’t simply ignore her like he usually would - he wanted to learn a bit more. He didn’t think himself a naive fool as to let her influence him to this extent - but then again she couldn’t be a witch either. Had it been any other woman, things would’ve been different - and then it clicked. Things were like this because it was her, because she affected him and because she interfered with how he usually thought and acted. He didn’t know why but one thing was clear and it was something he’d never admit to himself, Hanji, (Y/N), Erwin or anybody else. He’d die before saying it out loud.

"Corporal is everything alright?" Jean Kirstein's voice snapped him out of his thoughts and softened his expression. Levi looked up with a sigh.

"I have something to do." Groaning inwardly, he pushed himself off the bench and stood up, meeting (Y/N)’s worried gaze and hastening to ease her concern. "You stay here and chat with them or whatever. I'll be back." He headed towards Hanji, Erwin and Mike. Before doing anything else, he had to distance himself from (Y/N) and cease all contact with her after his part of the deal was done. For that to happen, he had to talk to his Commander. He’d promised her a job and, under the man who’d loved her or not, he’d get it for her.

"You're in." He stated coldly with crossed arms.

"I am?" She was literally beaming.

"I already said it, idiot. Are you fucking deaf?" He snapped but her grin was still and so was her posture.

"This is great! Now I get to spend time with my friends, I have a job and a home. Thank you so much.” (Y/N) piped excitedly and he only snorted.

"Anyway, until we find a free room for you you’ll be sharing with somebody.” He stated absentmindedly, feeling just a bit ticked off on this particular topic. Not that he had a reason to feel irritation because he’d known her for a day and she didn’t mean anything to him. That was how things should’ve been.

"Hanji?" (Y/N) guessed as she took a seat in the chair in front of his desk and he looked at the papers before him, pretending to read and trying his hardest not to pay attention to her. He reasoned why she wouldn’t be staying with Hanji and she went on to ask if it would be him she’d share a room with. He almost let out a snort and answered her question with a cold ‘no’. “Then who?” She pressed curiously, making him grit his teeth. He didn’t understand what he was so angry with. Maybe himself.

"Erwin."

"You're kidding me." She blurted out, to which he glared at her. She didn't seem overjoyed by the fact she was about to spend an unknown period of time with the handsome, tall and successful man that had feelings for her, instead she looked confused.

"Do I look like I enjoy joking around?" His questioned was a hiss and his eyes were cold and unforgiving. Her brows twitched.

"But Erwin’s the Commander, it’ll be troublesome for me to stay with him." (Y/N) reasoned, (e/c) hues gleaming as she spoke.

"He volunteered to take you in. Guess his feelings aren’t entirely gone." Levi commented after giving a spiteful click of the tongue, making (Y/N)'s eyes narrow at his visage.

"And how do you feel about that?" She inquired curiously, almost as if seeking confirmation on a topic she knew the answer to. The question ticked him off.

"What does that have to do with me?" He was playing unemotional and oblivious - he knew it had a little if not a lot to do with him but he refused to admit it. She shrugged, stating she’d just asked, and, without thinking at all, he got ahead of himself. "It doesn't make me feel anything. Did you expect me to argue with my Commander over you? Assert myself as the person who shelters you? If anything, I feel relieved to finally get you off my case. Whatever fantasies you might be harbouring, the reality is that I escorted you to a ball because I needed somebody and now you may go next door to let Erwin instruct you on your job."

Levi's scowl may have been terribly scary, but on the inside, he was on the verge of hitting himself because of how unreasonably rude he was being to a woman he thought he felt something for. (Y/N)'s reaction wasn't one of shock, nor one of heartbreak - it was one of deep indifference. And indifference was a mask he used all too often to let himself be fooled by it. She was offended and hurt as she stood up and headed to the door, then, with her hand on the doorknob, she turned her eyes to him.

"Just for the record - I expected nothing from you and I harbour no fantasies, you're right when you say Erwin still has feelings for me, but you're wrong when you say you’re impartial. Even if you don't like me, I have to say I took quite the liking to you." He could almost hear how her voice broke at the last word. "I’m just sorry I won’t have the chance to say it to your face as a woman instead of a stupid peasant."

The door closed after her, leaving behind the voice which had betrayed her upon the word ‘peasant’. If he’d known more about her, he would’ve realised how it hurt her to say it because that’s what she’d been her whole life - a faceless nameless stupid peasant. But he didn’t know. He leaned back in his chair after realising he’d tensed with the intention to stand and go after her. Shoulders slumping, he groaned and closed his eyes at the thought of having made her cry. He was getting a headache.

"A lovers quarrel a day after your first meeting. Fucking way to go." He praised himself mockingly and wished to endure the worst headache in existence if it would give him the chance to fix this situation. It was an unrealistic wish but he wanted it nonetheless. He tried beating it into his head that he’d known her for a day but he wanted to see her smile again and it was a pity he probably never would.

He started this conversation so angry and ended it so regretful that it was a pitiful thing to watch.

"Is this your way of saying 'sorry'?" She asked with disbelief as he looked at her with pleading eyes.

"You could say so." He nodded weakly and she snorted.

"It's not romantic at all." She placed her hands on her hips and his brows furrowed as he glared at her.

"Is it supposed to be?" He inquired and she smirked slightly. He hadn’t realised how much he missed that - it had been a goddamn month since it had been directed to him last.

"Of course, after all the indirect insults you threw at me."

"If it makes you feel better if I was still a thug, I'd want to fuck you senselessly." His deadpan statement was an attempt at brightening the mood and it brought him so much more when she began laughing - a month since he’d heard that one too.

"Enough of a compensation. But I don’t get why before is different from now since you’re the same person." Her objection made his eyes narrow - of course they weren’t much different in nature but he couldn’t let himself rush into something he hadn’t had ever. He didn’t need love and support - he’d been fine without them until now. Sex was another thing he could get but preferred not to because she, unlike him, probably connected it to something more emotional.

"I have boundaries now and I’m more self-conscious." She snorted with laughter once more, though he would be surprised to hear why.

"Of what - the perfect body, the flawless face, the smooth voice or the heart of gold under all the piled-up bad experience?" Her mocking question made it hard for him to distinguish whether she’d meant to tease or compliment him. Maybe both - it sounded like her.

"Of the fact I’m far from flawless yet I'm supposed to be a role model to young cadets. Of the fact I fight and promote that others die as they fight. Of the fact I’m worshipped by kids who don’t really know me, kids I’ll probably outlive." His voice was low and deep, tired, morose. Silence followed. Then (Y/N) nudged his shoulder and he watched her empathetic smile. She couldn’t say anything to make him feel better. "Does this mean you accept my apology?"

"Of course. Who can resist when it’s obvious you’re trying so hard?" (Y/N) chuckled when the raven glared at her but quickly calmed down, only to glance shyly at the ground right after. "I'm sorry, too. I rushed to snap back at you."

"You've nothing to apologise for, I deserved it.” He countered, making her blush slightly before she patted his shoulder with a smile.

"Since we're going to be seeing each other often, let's talk when something like this happens again, alright?" Levi rolled his eyes before nodding - way nonchalant than the furious ‘yes’ pushing at his lips. The small ‘fine’ he uttered earned him one of her grins. His stomach took a turn. He focused on his heartbeat - either it hadn’t skipped or he’d been lucky enough not to have heard it. "But next time be a bit more romantic." She joked whilst getting up, to which he only glared.

"Romantic? More like no thanks. I’m not romantic and will not attempt to become romantic." He stated coldly as they walked out the mess hall and headed towards their respective rooms.

"I can teach you." She suggested with a small shrug and he snorted at her.

"As if you're any better."

"You don't have a way of knowing. I may just be a hidden romantic." (Y/N) flashed him yet another terribly attractive smirk and it would've been a lie to say it didn’t make his heart beat faster but he was adamant not to admit it.

"Or I may just be the princess of the walls." He teased, his voice rid of all emotion. The woman next to him was still able to sense his sarcasm. He rolled his eyes and she slapped his shoulder playfully, laughing and feigning offence - it ended in vain. Maybe he could learn to accept the fact he regarded her in such a way after a few months. Just a few. And maybe if he got the chance he’d tell her too. Or not. He was fine with just watching her smile and , by god, if somebody took that from him he would kill to get it back.

Such determination was so him in spite of the topic, he never understood how all of this became so natural to the point it happened every day.

#levi x reader #levi ackerman fanfiction #reader insert #canon stuffs #watch this sequel be almost as ooc as the first part #or wayyyy more #dunno #let's assume i can't write and levi is especially soft in this one

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ectonurites · 3 years ago

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Conner Kent in Suicide Squad/the Infinite Frontier era: wtf is going on

Alright lads hello I just need to type out some theories/thoughts about what’s going on with my boy Kon right now. This is more for myself than anything else (just trying to organize my thoughts) but since some of y’all like to hear me talk about comics (and some of this discussion has already been happenin in my inbox) I figured i’d format it and put it on here too! its like 4k words and written over the last few days mostly at 3am. sorry <3

this is basically just me going like

Also fair warning that like, I can be wrong and misinterpret things just as much as anyone else can, like I use panels to support why I think what I do but a lot of this stuff is subjective/complicated to understand so like... in general somethings should be taken with a grain of salt, especially because exactly what changes to the universe were made by Death Metal/Infinite Frontier haven’t been super super clearly defined yet. Also sometimes comic writers make the most random nonsensical shit happen, so I as a fan am also allowed to theorize about random nonsensical shit.

But to start: let’s backtrack!

Many months ago when Infinite Frontier was first announced they dropped some promotional art, and I remember being a little confused because. Well:

(Variant Cover spread for Justice League (2018) #59)

(Variant Cover spread for Superman (2018) #29)

Notice how Conner is back to his Teen Titans 2003 look up top, but in his YJ 2019 look at the bottom? This seemed weird to me! But then they announced that Conner would be part of the Suicide Squad ongoing title, in the T-shirt look, so I wrote this discrepancy off in my brain as ‘oh I guess that cover was just the last hurrah for punk Kon’ and moved on with life.

In Suicide Squad right away we learn he’s very much so there against his will:

(Suicide Squad (2021) #1)

Which corroborates more or less what we were also shown in Future State: Suicide Squad, although admittedly it tells... a slightly different version of the events. When I first saw both of these together I just chalked it up to being a bit inaccurate as it’s shown as a memory in Future State:

(Future State: Suicide Squad #2)

Issue 2 we saw him in action with the Squad, trying to do his best to still be a hero despite the team, but things get a little more interesting in the following issue. It starts off with an account of his history

(Suicide Squad (2021) #3)

This page gave me a few immediate red flags, mostly minor things that had to do with coloring, so more irl problems than things to take seriously in-universe (Kon’s pants are the wrong color in the first Superboy shot, and Bart’s Impulse costume is in Kid Flash colors instead of the correct Impulse ones) but then also it just bugged me the phrasing “he joined Young Justice” when he was a founder of the team, he didn’t join it he made it with Tim and Bart.

But again, chalked that stuff up to just.... writers/artists being inconsistent/unaware of things that they should be aware of, or even Nocturna just not being specific with details. But it did still strike me as a little odd considering the very accurate use of villains in those same shots, Scavenger who was a reoccurring bad guy from Kon’s solo days and showed up basically nowhere else (even holding the Spear of Lono and everything!) and Billy/Harm (Greta’s brother) from Young Justice.

But then a few pages later we got this:

(Suicide Squad (2021) #3)

Which is interesting. My first instinct was to think he’s being drugged w kryptonite or something thats leaving him hazy/out of it, but my thoughts on that have kinda changed, we’ll get there in a bit. But in general the context of ‘something’s wrong’ made the slight discrepancies on some details of his own history make more sense.

I also want to then bring up the next part to this story, the crossover issue in Teen Titans Academy.

(Teen Titans Academy #3)

So a few things. Does it feel weird to anyone else that Conner Kent, a known previous Titan who literally has a framed picture of himself in a case there, would set off alarm sensors like that? Wouldn’t he be... recognized as a Titan not an intruder by their sensors? Interesting! Anyways.

He looks really pained looking at that picture, and sad, and almost frustrated, which ya know makes sense and hurts my heart because he misses them! He misses his friends and being happy.

But, importantly for a criticism I wanna make thats less theory related and more just me bein annoyed at Tim Sheridan, that’s a picture of Conner. Right there. That’s Superboy, on display at Teen Titans Academy, so the people who frequent this building would know who he is and what he looks like and be able to recognize him, he’s even in the same outfit and everything. Alinta recognized him at the end of Suicide Squad #3.

So why does only one person during this big fight then comment on his presence?? Why doesn’t it get a bigger reaction???

(Teen Titans Academy #3)

And after the fight we don’t see any on panel moment of Wallace going up to the staff Titans (who weren’t present for the fight) and saying like “HEY NIGHTWING UHHH SUPERBOY WAS WITH THE SUICIDE SQUAD?” we just see him talking with his friends upset about Crush leaving. We see Alinta talking to them but we don’t see the exact dialogue. So I do just wanna take the writer by the shoulders and shake him a little bit and ask WHY because that just feels like... something you’d wanna address on panel! This is like the first time since joining the squad that Kon’s at all in contact with people from his life before Waller got involved, I feel like not addressing those people’s reactions to it/not discussing it at least a little bit on panel (especially when Conner CAME UP in the previous TTA issue, Dick brought him up and everything!!!) is a really odd choice. Maybe it’ll happen next issue and i’m just impatient, but who knows. Anyways, gripes with Sheridan aside, lets move on.

I wanna bring up how Conner... doesn’t really respond to Wallace’s question? At all? Except to just fight him off, not even an attempt at a ‘Sorry’ or anything? (the ‘Ha! That all you got?!’ seems to be coming from Culebra not Conner, although the placement of the bubble is vague enough it could be that it was supposed to be Conner? but it seems more like what she’d say, especially as she’s grabbing Emiko like that) That just feels weird. It feels off. In general he speaks so little in Suicide Squad #3 and this issue. Tbh it almost feels like he doesn’t really recognize Wallace which I mean I suppose they never exactly met (they would have theoretically during Death Metal, basically all past/present Titans were together for a while during that), but Kon’s been back in existing long enough he’d have a sense of who current heroes are anyways.

But right, so, lots of little things that feel weird... that gets us caught up to the most recently released comics... but in this household we look at solicits as they drop. Which gives us some info on what’s coming up a few months ahead of time, albeit without full context obviously. Issues #4 and #5 don’t mention Conner in their descriptions or show him on the covers at all, because there’s just other plot things going on, so ya know seems things will be quiet for him for a bit.

But then we got the August solicitations and oh BOY it’s a doozey for him! And some things start to kinda connect perhaps!

I want to just take a moment to look at that specific wording. “The teen calling himself Conner Kent” I’m probably reading too much into it but that feels deliberate, like why wouldn’t you just say ‘Conner Kent’? Usually these kinds of descriptions are trying to keep a low word count, not add in extra words that don’t need to be there. It makes it feel like that’s a name he’s using that... doesn’t actually belong to him.

So the theory I want to propose (that has been floating around already) is that based on these covers and the description, and how the Conner we’ve been seeing in Suicide Squad apparently talks about his own personal history like he’s ‘reading a wikipedia entry’ and had little response to people he should be aware of like Wallace and apparently isn’t recognized as a Titan through a bio-scan and also bearing in mind those initial promo arts with two separate looks at the same time for him... I think we're looking at a situation where the Conner in Suicide Squad so far has actually been a clone of original Conner (like... like he’s Match 2.0 or somethin) the whole time, that’s just not aware he’s not the original.

Now that’s the base theory I wanna work with and build off of, but there’s MANY different directions that could go in/ways that could work.

For example, one idea is that the Conner we saw in #1 who was chained up is the original Conner, and he’s been being cloned and held captive, so everything else with Conner in Suicide Squad so far has been this Match 2.0

Another idea could be the original Conner in #1 is also the Conner in #2 who Waller had then commented wasn’t ready during the mission in Arkham and had zapped with a lil Kryptonite, and after that moment she took him off the field because his spirit hadn’t been broken enough to be obedient (as he was a lot quieter in Issue #3 & the TTA crossover compared to #2, and #3 is when the Nocturna thing with the history happened)

Or it could even be original Conner in #1, then in #2 was one clone that wasn’t ‘ready’ that after that point she stopped using him, and switched to a diff clone for #3, because like that first cover did show a LOT of clones. That could be more just ‘artistic interpretation’ or something, covers sometimes do exaggerate/mislead, but it also could indicate we’re looking at a lot of clones.

(Suicide Squad (2021) #2)

With all of those in mind I also wanna bring up this little bit from Future State Suicide Squad:

(Future State: Suicide Squad #2)

Again Future State is a ‘possible future’ so stuff from it isn’t set in stone, but the idea of ‘she still has his YJ 2019 outfit somewhere’ makes me think it could be something along the lines of like, Clone!Conner finds original Conner and frees him and he gets back his YJ outfit, which could lead to like the imagery on that variant cover/the idea from my very first part of this post where I was talking about Kon being shown in both outfits in different places.

Alternatively entirely from all that, another option is that she maybe got ahold of what was needed to clone Kon, but doesn’t even have the original Kon in her possession. (again with the Future State thing, she could be lying since elsewhere in Future State we did also see a copy of YJ 2019 Kon’s costume in one of the Jon-focused Future State comics in a display case 🤷‍♂️) Which could also lead to that confrontation on the variant cover & the promo art thing... and could also explain why we have seen nothing about anyone looking for him, because in that sort of scenario he wouldn’t have even been missing in the first place.

There’s a lot of possibilities! It’s still too early to solidly know anything, but I feel pretty confident we’re entering another cloning related plot with our Clone Boy so it’s... ya know. Clone time. On the one hand it’s annoying because god we have done clone/multiple Kons plots before. We’ve done them so much.

BUT on the other hand, I think it could be interesting to use this situation to tie into some older stuff from pre-reboot that I can see some connections to, because due to Infinite Frontier altering the world and people’s memories it’s all technically fair game storytelling-wise again (and like, the use of Scavenger specifically in that flashback way above, who’s not a super well known villain in general, makes me think maaaaybe the writer did do some of their Kon homework)

Something also just dawned on me that i’m not quite sure what it means but still is worth mentioning: The Conner here in Suicide Squad is back in his Teen Titans Vol. 3 outfit, and his history as he tells it stops during Teen Titans Vol. 3. And doesn’t... mention when he died? It feels like it... stopped before that, because like I feel if he was telling his life history (even the wiki version LMAO) the part where he died and came back would be pretty important to bring up?? And Nocturna specifically says that he didn’t explain how that stuff from TT Vol. 3 then led to him in his current situation. That’s a pretty big gap (like uhhh everything from resurrection until he got lost on Gemworld + all the rest of the Young Justice 2019 stuff?) So like.. there could be something funky going on here that has to do with that.

Similarly when he flashes back in Future State: Suicide Squad to his past it also goes right from Teen Titans Vol. 3 to the current Suicide Squad run? Like I get it’s one page so they can’t show that much, but the fact that there’s now two places that flash back to that same specific time period and nothing past it until the Suicide Squad feels just... noticeable! Not concretely indicative of something, but noteworthy.

(Future State: Suicide Squad #2)

Like...this almost has me thinking maybe it could be something where like, they tampered with his dead body and cloned from that? BECAUSE, for those of you who may not be familiar with how Kon’s resurrection (during Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds) worked, when he came back there was time travel involved! He was brought back to life in the future (like. Legion of Superheroes era) because it was a process that took that thousand or so years to work/heal him (essentially because of his hybrid dna the process that healed Clark when he had died back in Death of Superman/Reign of the Supermen in the 90s just took a lot longer, but its the same Kryptonian healing chamber thing) meaning when he came back to the present alive again, his dead body was still also in the present just in it’s process of healing. Meaning especially if we’re bringing back stuff from before the reboot, Kon likely has his dead body just vibing out there while he’s goin around living life 🤷‍♂️

SO them doing something related to that could explain the choice to put him back in the T-shirt (since thats what he wore in the era his brain would be caught up to if we’re relating this to when he died) and why he’d recognize himself in a group photo with Bart, Cassie and Tim but maybe not someone like Wallace who didn’t exist back then. I don’t know, this branch of thought is still half baked. Will maybe come back and elaborate on this later. But I’m now really thinking there might be a connection to the early Teen Titans Vol. 3 era specifically because of it being referenced twice in stuff with this Suicide Squad.

ANYWAYS moving on, this is probably a shot in the dark and I only thought of it because I just was reading 90′s Superboy, but right away when thinking about ‘Amanda Waller’ and ‘Cloning Kon’ I was reminded of some stuff about the circumstances around the first clone that was made of Conner: Match.

(Superboy (1994) #35)

Match was created by an organization called ‘The Agenda’, that was after a while primarily under the control of The Contessa, Lex Luthor’s ex-wife, aided by Amanda Spence who had a personal grudge against Kon bc her dad was Paul Westfield the guy Kon was originally cloned from (before the Lex/Clark retcon). They were the big bad guys of an arc called The Evil Factory in Superboy (where Cadmus personnel got replaced with clones) which also then tied into the Sins of Youth event over in Young Justice (Remember how Match was posing as Superboy for a while there? yeah). After those plot lines finished the Agenda was pretty defeated (Amanda Spence was still out there and came back later but still) and... who got their hands on the remaining Agenda tech?

(Superboy (1994) #87)

Why none other than Amanda Waller herself!

If they re-canonized pieces of this (which also tied into Young Justice which ya know, YJ 2019 was all about re-establishing stuff from YJ even before Death Metal happened soooo) it would totally make sense for Waller to have complete access to the exact technology used to clone Conner before.

Now, a thing to consider here though is what happened to Kon after he’d been cloned that first time, where his DNA got all destabilized by the process (and he needed to go through a procedure with Roxy as a genetic template to keep him together, which was how he got stuck at age 16 for a while). This was something where he was fine for a period of time before the side effects began to kick in. Now, I think it’s worth mentioning that was also back in the days where he was not yet Lex & Clark’s clone, but still Paul Westfield’s. So there could easily be a ‘now that certain Kryptonian genes have kicked in as he got his newer powers it doesn’t destabilize him the same way’ reasoning or something along those lines to avoid this problem. Alternatively, it could be an interesting thing to embrace rather than retcon away, especially if we’ve been seeing Clone Conner in action and Original Conner hasn’t been in our focus, things could be wrong with him that we just don’t know about.

Another branch of thinking that I think is even MORE a shot in the dark but could be interesting (or again even related to what I just said, could be a combo of things) is if this somehow ended up related to those clones that were reverse engineered from the remains of Match from the very end of Teen Titans Vol. 3

(Teen Titans (2003) #99)

All of them were then taken down with Kryptonite and killed in battle (by Rose & Damian)

(Teen Titans (2003) #100)

But like... idk man if Waller got her hands on those corpses or even just the data from Dr. Caligan that he extracted from Match to make them... that could also be a potential way to make some new Conner clones, and that could be why the bio-scan thing at Titans Tower wouldn’t work properly because of the thing he says above about it not being a “complete match’

One thing I don’t think is the case, but has been brought up to me, is stuff with New 52 Kon. I’ve talked extensively about New 52 Kon in recent weeks because I read through all his stuff, but the thing that makes me shy away from him being part of this situation is the fact that... he’s not interchangeable with Kon the way I think some people think he is. He wouldn’t visually be recognized as Original Kon because he is literally on a genetic level a separate person. They’d prob look related, sure, like they’d pass for brothers because they both have Clark’s DNA, but New 52 Kon has Lois’ DNA and Original Kon has Lex’s. New 52 Kon would likely look more like Jon, rather than Kon. Lois specifically commented in an Action Comics issue that Kon had some resemblance to Lex, even. So like, things like Wallace recognizing him or him looking at his own matching reflection alongside the group picture at the Tower... those wouldn’t happen the same way if this was New 52 Kon.

Now I think it coooould theoretically be possible for Waller to have gotten her hands on that future N.O.W.H.E.R.E. cloning tech that had been used to make New 52 Kon, like I wouldn’t rule that out. Because she knows where the remains of their bases are as shown in Red Hood and the Outlaws (2016) #16-17, and like, Harvest is dead so she could easily just send teams out there to gather shit if she wanted.

Onto some other things I don’t think are actually related but that I was reminded of/wanted to address:

I feel i’d be a bad timkon fan if during all of this discussion of past stories with cloning Kon I didn’t even bring up Tim’s cloning attempt stuff, but I think it would ultimately be unrelated. His tech was stolen from Luthor, and his attempts didn’t succeed because he was trying to build from scratch without Cadmus’ the data about how they altered the DNA from the original process.

(Teen Titans Vol. 3 #34)

Then that initial cover for the annual really reminded me of part of the Hollow Men story from Superboy Vol. 5 just with like... Kon in a room full of copies of himself. I don’t think this story would be related either because it was more magic Tannarak stuff rather than regular cloning, but ya know. It’s the imagery.

(Superboy Vol. 5 #9)

It also really reminded me of the stuff from Hyper-Tension which was hypertime stuff not cloning but again just... visually.

(Superboy Vol. 4 #62)

In general I don’t think we’re EVER gonna see Black Zero or any of these multiverse Superboys again LMAO.

To try to sum up all of this in a way that might make sense here’s kinda a... flowchart of some of my main ideas for what the cloning situation could be/how the logic could work. Again this is borrowing stuff from across continuities because Infinite Frontier means theoretically anything’s fair game. (Also I don’t think I mentioned this earlier but I do mention it in the chart, but I think it’s also reasonable that Waller could get her hands on Cadmus tech if Cadmus is like properly made canon again. She just has funky government connections!)

Also I just now thought of this now several hours after I already made the chart and I don’t wanna remake it so sorry not incorporating it there but I remembered there was also that bit during House of Kent where Clark took Kon to the Hall of Justice and they were running some tests on him, so I’m thinking it’s also possible Waller got ahold of that data/that might be how she found out about Kon in the first place for this timeline. And they indicated that there was something wrong with him there, where he might eventually lose his powers or something, so maybe she tried to do cloning stuff to be able to have a copy of Superboy in his prime or something??? before that started kicking in. I don’t know, just more things to consider:

(Action Comics (2016) #1028)

ANYWAYS in conclusion: there is clone fuckery of some sort happening, I’m curious where it’s gonna go, and I just want Kon to be okay.

If you actually read this uhm. props to you bc this probably makes no sense to anyone but me its just word vomit <3

#this is very long! and disorganized! i am sorry #this doesn't have one theory abt things it has like. many #its basically just brainstorming/spitballing ideas #i could also be entirely off base! with much of this! i just feel i need that disclaimer #grandpa max is god? i go to church now #i need a kon talk tag bc i swear i write more analysis stuff like this for him than anyone else

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batarella · 4 years ago

Text

The Bullet: A Sequel to The Commander - Part 7 *FINALE* (Jason Todd x Reader)

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH THIS FUCKING FINALE I SWEAR. HOPE YOU GUYS ENJOY BECAUSE THIS IS THE MOST ACTION PACKED FINALE I’VE EVER WRITTEN.

WORDS: 14349 WARNINGS: FIREARMS, VIOLENCE, DEATH

MASTERLIST

THE BULLET MASTERLIST

-----

Strapped onto the wheel chair like a rabid circus freak, Y/N knew exactly where she was headed. She just didn’t know what for.

With her neck being held back she could only look at the bulbs of white fluorescent light that continually passed by her and couldn’t do so much as look at the ground. Plenty of guards were around her as well. She didn’t bother struggling, nor did she speak. But there were even more armed guards lining up, going to wherever she was going as well. All the way up to a white room.

A mission. Her first mission with the squad. Just delightful.

“Deadshot?” the guard near the door asked. When the ones carrying her wheelchair gave him her files, she was let in.

She was the last one to arrive. Because everyone had their eyes on her the moment she graced them with her presence.

The first one that caught Y/N’s eye was, of course, Amanda Waller. With the room littered with her goons and guards, the woman stood at the very front, against a blank wall with her hands behind her back and her eyebrow quirked up right at Y/N. Y/N squinted her eyes back at her, some sort of a decline to her superiority, and Waller looked amused.

Then when the guards parted to make way for her, she was brought to the very center of the room, where there were five rather familiar faces giggling and snarling at the newest member of the squad. The one at the center, Rick Flag, ordered his men to place Y/N on the leftmost side.

Those faces, the ones she’s seen more often than she wished she had. Some already knew her. Some hated her. And some simply didn’t care.

Harley Quinn. Of course, out of everyone else in the room, was the only one bubbling with laughter and other nonsense spurting out of her mouth. She was waving her legs around the wheelchair like a little girl would on a swing. And she was staring at her, laughing. “WE GOT A NEW GIRL ON THE SQUAD!!!” she bellowed out. “WHAT?! DEADSHOT’S NEICE. THAT’S NEPOTISM RIGHT THERE.” Y/N ignored her.

The one beside her was someone she didn’t know personally, someone she’s never even met. They said this guy came from Australia and robbed almost every bank there was. Captain Boomerang. He, too, was strapped to a chair, though he wasn’t as loud as Harley. Y/N saw him eye her head to toe while he bit his lip, and she shot Boomerang a knife-like scowl before his eyes got too comfortable.

The next one. Killer Frost. A beautiful woman with ice-white skin and the hair of an arctic fox. She didn’t give Y/N so much as a glance. Most probably because they had her stored in a coffin-like chamber with only a glass window where her head could be seen. On the inside, she could see the glass covered in frost, and the chamber looked cold to touch. She was calm, reserved. And looked on at Waller’s direction.

The creature beside Frost was the one she really wouldn’t want to mess with the most. The largest in the room, with blue skin and a body ten times the mass of any human being possibly could be. He had the head of a shark, eyes red like her optics. He even had a fin sticking out his back. and he was muzzled and strapped standing upright with five more guards around him. Y/N could hear him growl, wordless, and when she caught his eye, he snarled at her.

Finally, El Diablo. The quietest out of the bunch. His wheelchair looked just like hers, except his hands were completely covered by iron cylinders, probably filled with ice cold water. The man was covered in tattoos, and he didn’t have a shirt on. His face looked like a skull’s, which made the way he looked at everyone else look more menacing than his supposed behaved demeanor.

These were the dangerous people she’s stuck with, most probably for the rest of her life if all else fails and she’ll never be able to get out. The people that Floyd had worked with. And they were a few of the most maniacal villains there were in the whole country. She wished she could tell herself she didn’t belong. But she actually did. In fact, she had no business going about pretending to be better than all these people. When it came to how much blood they’ve shed, she probably wasn’t too far off from Harley. Maybe even more.

Y/N was right where she truly belonged. Today, she is welcomed as the newest member of the Suicide Squad.

Waller stepped out to the front. “Y/N, your team. Let’s cut to the chase. We don’t have much time. Bring out the files.”

These files were then projected onto a holographic screen against the wall behind Waller. It was a photo of Scarecrow.

“Some of you probably have heard. Just yesterday, Dr. Jonathan Crane released his new toxin in the National Bank of Gotham.”

The screen started to show footage of what went on in the Bank.

“Our first mistake was thinking Scarecrow had launched the same kind of toxin as the last time, but as the surviving victims were brought out to the stations, they continued to showed the side effects of the toxin, including mania, hallucinations, homicidal tendencies, unnatural human strength, and even cannibalism. Even after being held for observations for more than twenty-four hours, they, unfortunately, could not be brought back.

“Which means that Crane had finally developed a fear toxin that causes permanent effects to anyone who does so much as inhale the gas…”

She heard guards shuffle and hold their guns tighter.

“I have a question!” Harley screamed, holding her hand up despite it being strapped to the chair.

“Flag. Muffle her.”

“Muffle me!? What do you-MMMMM!”

“As I was saying. The victims were forced to be euthanized when none of the doctors could bring them back. One hundred-twenty people died in the incident and the whole country is in a state of panic.”

“MMM MMM MMM?!” Harley asked.

“Yes. The whole country. Months ago, Dr. Crane had blackmailed the crime syndicate Carmine Falcone, who he instructed to forge buy outs of several other Gotham businessmen, stole almost all their money before hiring a certain hitman-“ she stared at Y/N. “-To assassinate them all one by one before his shortcomings are detected. That placed Falcone’s total net worth to be almost two hundred billion dollars. Or so we thought.

“After Falcone’s death, Crane had already taken all the money for himself and had used to build what might be the end to all of mankind. A new Cloudburst weapon. This time large enough to engulf the whole country in his new toxin, as well as a brand-new militia army of hundreds of men guarding his device. Mankind as we know it will be haunted with his obsession with fear and we will all be nothing but goddamn zombies.”

“MMMM!” Harley thrashed about in her chair, then she spat out her gag. “Yuck! That was disgusting! I was about to say that gag had a bug and it crawled down to my throat but it actually wasn’t that bad!”

“Harley!” Rick Flag screamed. Harley pouted and stuck out her tongue.

“And what is it you want us to do, Waller?” Boomerang asked with his heavy accent. “You want us to go there and possibly inhale this bloody toxin!?”

The screen turned to a helicopter’s sight. “Last night, we managed to tracked down a dome-shaped building in the deserted areas outside New Jersey with more than five hundred men guarding it inside and out. It is suspected that the weapon might be hidden somewhere in its center. Your job is to go there, eliminate Dr. Crane and his army, and destroy that weapon with whatever means necessary.

“And as for your concern, our teams have developed a mask for you all to wear. It has the filter to go against the toxin. We found it on one of the Arkham Knight Militia’s men and developed our own.”

Oh. Shit. That. She totally forgot. Man, how time flies.

“Let’s not waste anymore time. Flag. Take them to the airport and give them their gear.”

“Weeeeee!” Harley squealed as they started wheeling her out of the room.

Y/N had no idea where to start, if she even had a place to start.

Everything Waller mentioned, it could all be traced back to her. In so many ways. And she knew it. Everyone in the room probably knew it. It was only fair that she be involved in trying to correct it at all. She had no business complaining or thinking she should be somewhere else. This was Waller’s way, hell, this was the whole goddamn world’s way of handing to her what she truly deserved. And she was so tired of constantly being the cause of hurt and pain. So many mistakes, costing her everything she’s ever known to love. She really, truly belonged here. More than Harley. More than Killer Frost. More than anyone else in the squad.

Because without her even knowing, she’d been involved in this mess before any of Scarecrow’s plans were even thought of. With the militia, the Cloudburst, Falcone’s assassinations. In so many ways, none of this would have happened if not for her.

But did she even have the time to blame herself? When it would barely do her any good?

As Y/N was taken to the plane, beside the other members of the squad, she focused on the buzzing and Boomerang’s rants and Harley’s cackles. She even caught the eye of King Shark and didn’t budge.

Because of course, in a way, she was to blame. She knew Crane had something planned when he almost had her killed that one, terrible night trying to lessen the odds of her ruining his plan once more. And another one of her stupid mistakes was to completely forget about it.

They arrived a few hours later. On the military base somewhere in the interstate, even more soldiers and guards waited for them in the barren grounds surrounded by their tents.

She was the farthest behind, the last one to be wheeled out of the plane. When Rick Flag met them at the center where suitcases and crates were being brought out. He waited until most of the squad members had settled.

“Everyone. Stand your ground. Unlock them and give them their gear. If you idiots do so much as look at me differently, I will detonate the bombs.”

“We know the drill, mate,” Boomerang spat at him.

“I know. I was talking to the new girl.”

Y/N’s wheelchair stopped. Then, they were all released from their straps, from their chairs. Harley hopped up and stretched out her arms, then took out her clothes from the crates and her enormous hammer. Boomerang fixed his coat, then he had a single boomerang from his case. He threw it in the air, and a few seconds later, it came flying back.

Killer Frost, with the air suddenly becoming a little chillier when the chamber opened, walked out and grabbed her icy-blue suit. She didn’t have any more weapons. El Diablo was slow to move, but when the chains were unlocked, he got a single hoodie jacket and hid himself from everyone else.

King Shark, on the other hand, put up most of a fight. Terrified soldiers had their shields up when they released him from his confines and he roared directly at Flag’s face. Flag didn’t budge.

Y/N stood up from her chair, stretched her neck, then cracked her knuckles.

As an entire arsenal of guns was brought to her, she stared vacantly at her red and gray suit and the white mask at the bottom of the crate.

That wasn’t her. It didn’t call out to her anymore the way it did just a few days ago. It was a layer of skin laid over her flesh that wasn’t hers at all. She wasn’t Deadshot anymore.

She can't wear this suit.

Y/N eyed another crate nearby. It must have belonged to the other gunmen in their army.

She can make something out of these.

Nobody batted an eye when she started scavenging for parts.

Black body armor, covering her chest, shoulders, and knees. Dark pants covered in straps and holsters on her hips and thighs. Boots that went up to her knees, covered with the pads. And underneath the armor was a dark blue body suit, making her look completely different from her uncle’s red one. Her wrist gun, spray painted blue. And lastly, a black hood with a mask that covered her nose and mouth.

Around her neck was a small silver chain with the diamond ring through its loop. Y/N longingly stared into its crystal, looking back at everything Jason had promised her. How she believed them even when they weren’t so possible. How much she missed him.

She stuffed it under her suit and placed the hood over her head.

Already, she’d shed off that foreign skin. This was her. This was Y/N.

When everyone was ready, Flag came up to the crowd.

“No longer Deadshot, are you?”

“No,” she said.

“Then what do we call you?”

She simpered.

“The Bullet.”

-----

This had to be all theatrics. Not to mention completely unnecessary. Jason got off his motorcycle and parked it right outside the gate.

Somehow, they kept it. Even the fence. And it still had ‘Wayne Manor’ on its wrought iron bars even when the field behind it had been completely emptied out. The ruins and everything left behind after the manor exploded had been cleared out and demolished. Still, they chose not to do anything with the land, even when millionaires fought over it and maybe a few intruders with metal detectors breaking in to look for the Batcave.

Dick told him to meet him and the rest of the family there. He had no idea where, but when he stepped into the gate, Dick was there leaning against the vine-covered fence behind it. Jason wasn’t so sure how to greet him. the last time they saw each other, they were at each other’s throats. Literally. Now at their mercy, he wasn’t so sure what was the quickest way to let his pride down without looking too much of a desperate asshole.

“Uhm. Hi,” Dick said.

“Hey.”

They stared at the grass.

“Are Babs and Tim coming?”

“Yeah. They just got out of their honeymoon.”

“Oh yeah. Congratulations to them.”

“You can tell Tim when we get to them.”

Of course. Tim. The replacement. He can totally congratulate him on his wedding without it sounding too awkward.

“We talk here?”

Dick wrinkled his forehead and laughed. “You thought we were gonna plan this whole thing out on an empty field?”

“This place sure looks like one.”

He threw his head back. “Come on. Follow me.”

Hands in his pockets, he trailed behind Dick. All the way over to the center of the field where there wasn’t so much as a porta potty for them to go into.

Then Dick pulled out his watch, which wasn’t a watch at all, and started to press onto its buttons.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Jason sighed when the ground underneath them suddenly started to rumble.

“What? You thought the cave went out with the explosion, too? Bruce wouldn’t let it go to waste.”

Then the grass, which turned out to be fake, had split into a large, rectangular shaped ramp that slowly descended down onto the undergrounds for them to walk onto. When it stopped, Jason pressed on his nose. “I can't believe I didn’t know about this.”

“Come on.”

They started walking down. “Barbara’s the one in charge. She practically runs the place.”

“I can see that.”

When they reached below ground, the Batcave was exactly as they had left it. The last time he was here, he was with Y/N, the Commander. And although they’d changed its entryway, the Batmobile and the Batwing were still there, the computers were still up and running. How massive it was and how bats were still up on the rocky ceiling looking down on them with their beady little eyes. Jason and Dick walked down the driveway and he let his hand run onto the batmobile’s surface.

Barbara and Tim were at the computers. They turned to the two and the way they looked at Jason wasn’t something he particularly liked being stared at.

“Hey, Babs.”

Barbara was the first to smile at him. “Hi, Jason.”

Then when he looked at Tim, who didn’t share the same smile, he stopped himself from scratching an itch on his head.

“Hi… Tim…”

“Jason…” he coughed.

“Congratulations, by the way.”

“Thank you,” Babs said, then she reached out to Jason’s hand. He took it, for a while, then he pulled away.

“Sorry to hear about her,” Tim said.

“I know. But if you help me… and I thank you for helping me now… we can break her out.”

“Did you come up with a plan?” Dick asked him. Jason, arms crossed, turned over to the computer. Barbara had already gone ahead with looking up Scarecrow.

“If the squad is being sent out to deal with Crane, they might be going after that new weapon of his. We can go after them there and get her out before anyone sees.”

He stared at his hands. “I was hoping Babs could come up with some sort of devise that can disable the bomb in her neck.”

“Dick already told me. Don’t worry. I came up with something this morning.”

The three men followed behind her as she wheeled over to the table next to the keyboards.

“This,” she held out a device shaped like a thick pen. “If you can get her to settle down, you stick this thing to the back of her neck and it will send shocks right up to the nanite bomb. It should give it the voltage it needs to be disabled. It’s going to hurt. But it can save her.”

She was an angel. A literal angel. Just the thought of it gave him that little flutter of hope he definitely needed.

“Babs, I don’t know how to thank you…”

“Don’t worry about it. We’re here to help you.”

Two years ago, he had this woman kidnapped and sent to Crane, gave her the death scare of a lifetime and almost had Tim killed when Scarecrow had him captured.

It was too much. How none of their faces looked the least bit bothered. Dick held the pen and took off the needle cap, flinching, then he gave it to Jason.

Jason looked down on it, clearing his throat.

“I’m sorry…”

Dick, with his arms crossed, Tim leaning against the table, and Babs looking down at her hands, they all didn’t have much to say.

“I’m sorry for everything I did to you. All of you.”

“Jason…” Dick rubbed the back of his neck. “We used to be brothers-“

“No, I… I couldn’t. When this is over, I’ll be out of your way. And I owe you. All of you… But I shouldn’t stay…”

“You can. And you will. No matter how much you push yourself away… We’re here for you…”

Tim never looked up. But Jason knew, that if he were in his place right now, he’d be all over him with the ‘I told you so’s’ and the snide remarks. But the younger man was silent, didn’t even look at him the wrong way.

And that’s when he really felt like shit.

“We’re happy you came to us for help,” Babs said.

Jason hadn’t figured this part out when he reached for their help, but he knew something like this was about to happen. It was the entire reason why he didn’t want to. Because somehow, when it did, these guys won't hate him anymore, and he’ll end up hating himself instead.

Dick placed his hand on his shoulder. For a moment. Then when Jason’s body tensed, Dick pulled away.

“Now,” Babs went over to the computer. “Time to hack into the government.”

-----

The helicopter landed some distance away from the dome. The Bullet still had no idea why it was shaped that way. Just that it was new and humungous and completely littered with army men guarding every inch of it.

She, Harley, Boomerang, Killer Frost, King Shark, and El Diablo stepped out at the front lines, with Rick Flag right behind them, followed by their own army of men, though a number considerably less than what they were going up against. They had to be smart with this and break in.

They went into the forest, out on the fields. The dome was in a level ground lower than the lands around it, shaped in a circle, much like it was on a pit that was about two or three stories below ground. They crouched down on the bushes when they started reaching the edges of the pit and Flag looked out on his scopes.

“They’ve completely covered the perimeter.”

“Do we just attack?”

Flag put down his binoculars. “We are. To keep them distracted. When everyone’s backs are turned you six go in there and finish the job.”

“You say it like it’s so fucking easy,” Boomerang snarled. King Shark gritted his sharp teeth and growled staring at the armed men around the building.

A hand grenade. Right at one of the trees. It got their attention enough, especially when Flag started firing at the guards stationed just outside the entrance. Crowds of Scarecrow’s men, armed to the teeth, ran the outside grounds to go after Flag’s men. They drifted down the pit, outstretched their legs, and handled them at close range, while some stayed at the trees firing from afar.

The Squad, on the other hand, were all the way over to the other side. Almost all of them had ran off, except for two who stayed behind guarding the backside.

“Bullet,” Frost placed her frosted hand on her shoulder. It made her shiver. “You're up.”

The Bullet took out her sniper and shot down those two men almost at the same time. Then they slid down the side, King Shark rolling down with his immense weight. When another of Scarecrow’s men ran out the door, a boomerang landed on his head.

The door was locked. “I’ll take care of it,” Frost said. Boomerang scoffed, “Fucking metas.”

Holding out her hands, fumes of ice shot out from Frost’s palms and froze down the locks. King Shark kicked the iced hinges down, then the door fell to the ground.

“That was easy!” Harley skipped inside with her mallet over her shoulders. Diablo was still silent, still with his hands in his pockets.

“Don’t jinx it, Harls.”

It looked more like a warehouse by the entryway. And there was absolutely nothing inside save for a few cylinders and water tanks and a whole lot of pipes being guarded.

“We should probably sneak inside.”

“Sneak!?” Harley snorted at the Bullet. “Honey, we don’t do that here.”

King Shark growled at her, then he walked straight up to the center of the room.

“Intruder! Open fire!” the soldiers screamed.

“What is that thing!?”

“Just shoot!”

King Shark walked slowly towards those men, and the bullets just bounced off his incredibly thick skin. He held out his hand, stopped the bullets from reaching his face. Then when the soldiers had backed too much away and reached the wall, Shark grabbed them by the face and actually hurled them all the way across the room.

“Time to play!!!” Harley screamed, then she held out her mallet and started swinging it over at the guards.

Killer Frost had the ground frozen over, slipping the guards off balance, then shards of ice rose up from the ground to impale them. Boomerang had a more melee approach but had his trusty weapon to go around when he needed it.

The Bullet. The new, almighty Bullet. She pulled up her hood and mask and took out her AK.

She fired at the dozens of men going after her. Jumping on top of the cylinders, standing on the highest ground, she shot down anyone who came remotely close to her and had their bodies on the floor before they could even touch her feet. Over and over, she changed the magazines, took out more ammo. She let the gun take charge of her hands and head. A lot of the were swarming her, from different directions. Eventually too many of the soldiers were surrounding the pile of crates she stood on and the others started climbing up.

She couldn’t escape. Even if she were able to take them all down.

Until a raging fire shot out like a car-sized flame thrower and took out the guards that were climbing up. The water tank didn’t seem to have been damaged, but the men on it were burnt like a crisp, and they all started to run away. “Jump!” Diablo screamed.

She did, and she landed on the fire as well. She rolled on the floor to put it out before it got to her skin and Diablo helped her up. “Thank you.”

“Just go.”

She nodded, then with her pistol and wrist gun, went on to keep firing. Frost had a wall of the men being stuck to the block of ice, some completely frozen inside it, then King Shark let out an animalistic shriek before he punched the glass, destroying it into shards and impaling everyone inside.

Harley, on the other hand, just went on spinning around with her mallet, screaming, manically laughing. The bitch was insane.

“A little help here!” Boomerang called out. He was being held back by two men while another was punching at his chest. The Bullet pointed her wrist gun and fired at his attacker.

Even more men were coming. From the doors to the inside.

“We have to keep moving!” The Bullet cried out to them. To the door where the reinforcements kept coming from, she kept firing as she backed away. The whole squad moved, onwards towards the door. Then when they’d all reached it, Frost froze over the door with more than five layers of ice.

There were sounds of bashing and hitting against the icy door, but it should be enough to hold them back. Before them was a long, seemingly endless hallway. It should probably be leading them to the inside of the dome, where the weapon is.

“Ahhh. The Suicide Squad…”

“WOAH WOAH WOAH where the hell is that comin’ from!?�� Harley screamed.

The intercoms. Scarecrow was watching them. The Bullet put on her optics, now shining blue light, and looked around.

A camera. Right at the corner. She shot it with her wrist gun.

“And you have the Commander with you.”

“FUCKING SHUT UP!” The Bullet shot another camera hidden away.

“The Commander, huh,” Killer Frost looking at her head to toe. “You work with him before?”

“Shut up.”

“OH MY MOLLY,” Harley placed her hands on her mouth. “YOU'RE the Commander of the freakin’ Arkham Knight!! I remember you!”

“We should go-“

“I have so many questions. Huge fan. HUGE fan. Ya know she’s drove the first Cloudburst?”

Boomerang crossed his arms. “And they sent her to help us? The fuckin’ nerve of this scumbag coming up here actin’ all hero.”

“You watch your mouth, kangaroo.”

Diablo snorted and chuckled. Boomerang held out his weapon. “You want a piece of this?”

“A kid’s toy?”

“Don’t you fuckin-“

King Shark roared at the two with his mouth wide open for a good ten seconds and deafened their ears. The Bullet wiped his spit off her face and scoffed.

Frost led the way, all the way down its halls. When they reached a large gate, she froze it over once more and Shark beat it down with his fists and his foot.

They didn’t know they’d reach the center of the large dome. They thought they had more rooms to cover.

With the building so big, they thought it would have taken so much more time to reach the core.

But already, they were met with a cylindrical glass tank that was almost as thick as an entire building in itself, and it lit up the room in a menacing red light, all around. It was swirling, even boiling inside. And it shot all the way up to the roof, three stories high.

It was the fucking toxin.

The squad backed away.

Dozens of men surrounded them, all around the dimly lit room. And it was larger than any of them could have expected. It was circular, and there was only a suspended walkway that went all around the sides. There was a runway to the center, where there were controls. A man stood by them. A man with a rag on his head.

All of them with their hands up.

Scarecrow’s voice was on the intercom, and it echoed all throughout the dome loud enough to rattle their eardrums.

“I assume this wasn’t what you’d expected?”

No. Not even a little. This wasn’t what they expected at all.

They didn’t expect to already reach the weapon.

Or rather. Stand on top of the weapon.

The weapon wasn’t a ray gun or a tank or even a satellite. It wasn’t something so small that it would have been easily taken down by a tank or even King Shark’s fist. Even when it was to engulf the whole of America in its toxin.

No. it was none of that.

The Bullet trailed her eyes down the numerous pipes going up and around the walls, through the floor and over to the room where they just came from, where even more of the toxin was stored in tanks and the pipes that went around it.

The Cloudburst wasn’t inside the dome.

The Cloudburst was the dome.

-----

It didn’t take too much time. It wasn’t the first time Barbara had to hack into the American Government. In fact, it was the easier to hack into than some people’s private accounts.

She went into Amanda Waller’s files.

“Here. Finally.”

Dick, Jason, and Tim stood behind her.

“It looks like they’ve already sent out the squad. Just a few hours ago.”

“Who are in the squad?”

The files on Task Force X. Babs took out the profiles on all their subjects.

Harley’s picture was first to come up. Her blonde hair and vicious eyes staring at the screen. “Harley Quinn, of course. We got Louise Lincoln, also known as Killer Frost.”

The boys watched on.

“El Diablo. Captain Boomerang. King Shark. Rick Flag’s being sent out there as well.”

Then she stopped scrolling when Y/N’s picture and profile came up.

Jason’s heart broke. It did every time he does so much as look at a photo of her. And with that one, a mug shot, the mug shot that was going around every news station in town, the brokenness in her face, the darkness in what used to be the brightness in her eyes, how much rage she had for everything around the world, he hitched his breath.

‘Y/FN Y/LN

Age: 23

Alias: The Bullet’

He smiled at her new name. A sad smile. The most painful kind.

He missed her so much.

Setting his head to the side so they couldn’t see the tear that had seeped out, Jason swallowed and shut his eyes.

“Jason…”

“I’m alright. Can you find out where they were headed?”

Babs smiled at him, then went back to her keyboard.

Zooming in on the helicopter footage on the dome, she traced its coordinates.

“Is that-“

“Scarecrow’s base? Most probably.”

“Jesus,” Jason sighed. “I used to work with that guy.”

“This is the weapon, alright. The sensors are through the roof. We should be heading out there.”

“Do we have a plan?”

“Not exactly. We’ll know when we get there,” Dick said.

“We have to hurry. Who knows when that mad man actually detonates his bomb?”

“How? It’s two hours away.”

“Man,” Dick pat his back. “You really have to get used to working with us now that we’ve got Bruce’s old toys.”

Of course.

What else could he have possibly thought? Get there on his bike?

The Batwing was staring right at their faces, almost taunting them with its silent growl. Dick, Tim, and Jason walked up to it side by side.

“You think he’ll be happy with that?” Jason said.

“Not at all. He even threatens to kill us if we get anywhere near the wheel-“

“Which is why I’m here to drive, Master Dick.”

No.

It couldn’t be.

The sweet old butler, came up from behind the computers where there must have been a room for him to stay in, he held out a tray of four glasses of water for them to take. Setting it down on the table, he gave Jason the sincerest smile.

“I’ve missed you, dear boy.”

“Alfred.”

He wanted desperately to go up to him, give him the biggest bear hug until his bones crack, but Alfred held his hand up to him and just handed him his water.

“It’s better if we skip the ol’ reunion. We catch up after we’ve saved your girl.”

Everything was here. Everyone was here.

Clearly, it wasn’t the time to get emotional. And goddamn, he wasn’t the one to get emotional.

And all the more did they look like a family when the three boys suited up. Dick with his black and blue Nightwing suit and domino mask, Tim with his bo staff and red and yellow suit and cape. And Jason, with his hooded jacket and red visor.

Facing each other in a circle, Nightwing, Robin, and Red Hood took in how they were all now in one team, possibly for the rest of their career. No longer will they fight. No longer will they run.

Oracle smiled at the three. “You all look great together when you're not at each other’s throats.”

“You sure you won't let me drive, Alfred?” Robin said to the butler.

“I had specific instructions from Master Bruce that if you were to inherit the cave, no one was to drive the Batwing but me. You have until I die, Master Dick.”

“Awe. Even in his death, Bruce still doesn’t trust us.”

Laughing as they went in, Alfred had the Batwing soaring into the sky. Silently.

They were going to save her. Them. His family. The one he’d left. The one he thought he hated. The one he almost got killed.

He couldn’t possibly have done anything to deserve this.

With his visor up, he went up to Dick.

“Dick…” he choked.

His older brother turned to him, smiling. He knew what Jason was thinking.

And he didn’t let him speak to make things unnecessarily dramatic. He knew he had his brother back. Dick pulled him into a hug. A sweet, sincere hug that tore out every part of him that wasn’t already consumed by that string of humanity he once had left inside him.

“Thank you,” Jason said to him. Dick patted his back.

“We missed you, Jaybird…”

Jason closed his eyes.

When they pulled away, with Tim watching, he never actually got the change to get to know him. But one of these days, he will. And he’ll be a brother to him, too.

Jason nodded at him, smiling. Tim nodded back.

He never, ever would have thought they’d accept him like this, to help him like this.

And if Bruce were here, he’d have no idea what to tell him. But Jason did forgive him. He forgave him before he even knew he did. Maybe, if Bruce were anything like Dick and Tim, he would have accepted Jason back into his house. He would have helped him, as well.

He let himself think that. For his own sake. For his own peace.

Not long after, they reached the site.

Nightwing, Robin, and Red Hood stood at the Batwing’s exit doors.

-----

Harley must have had the worst of issues for her to be laughing this off, whistling as she marveled over the room. “I have to admit, Ragdoll, you cer’ainly out did yourself than the last time! I remember when all it took was Ivy’s tree to get rid of your toxin!”

Boomerang scoffed. “A tree?!”

“Gag her.”

“Awe, come on! What is it with you people and the gaggi- MMMMMM!”

Held back by a dozen of Scarecrow’s gunmen, with so many of their guns pointed right at their heads, they stood on their knees, hands tied to their backs. They watched Scarecrow walk over to them from his place near the glass. He chuckled, that low, dark, breathy, and utterly disgusting laugh when he went over the squad.

“MMM! MMM? Mmm…” Harley said to him when he passed by her. All he did was glare. When he passed by Frost, he eyed her body and how icy smoke was coming out of her pores.

“Ya know, this ain’t personal. I’d totally be into this. But we got an explosive stuck to me spine here, mate, and I really just don’t want to die,” Boomerang said. Scarecrow ignored him and walked over to Diablo.

She looked over. Diablo had melted away the ropes on his wrists and no one even noticed. He stood still, watching Scarecrow, then the rag-headed man went over to the next one.

The Bullet. The only one who actually hated this man to the bloody core.

Scarecrow looked amused at the darkness of her glower. He leaned over, pulled down her hood and mask with his disgusting fingers before she flinched away.

“Lovely to see you once more, Commander.”

“Don’t fucking call me that.”

“I thought I left you for dead. Turns out you survived your own bullets. Perhaps you're not as good as you thought you are-“

“Go to hell-“

“This is hell, Commander. At least, it will be.” When he stood back, he eyed the creature next to her.

“An animal? They brought an animal to the squad?” Scarecrow laughed.

King Shark roared. The loudest, more nightmarish roar. Then he charged after him with his large mouth littered with almost three rows of teeth on each side. The guards pulled him back, shot a taser to his arm, but it didn’t do much damage.

Scarecrow backed off and immediately he was guarded by his men.

“Kill him.”

“No!” Killer Frost screamed, but even she was held back by three guards.

And it was the most cruel thing they’ve ever seen. The Bullet watched on, as her fellow squad member was shot with three tranquilizer darts. He fell to the ground, unconscious.

Then Scarecrow’s men took out a grenade.

Shit.

They stuffed it into King Shark’s mouth.

And the squad looked away when it detonated not even two seconds later.

His head was blown off. Much like it would have been if Flag had done it himself.

Five of them left.

Against an army of hundreds.

“Now. You all get to watch as the entire country slowly descends into their deepest, darkest nightmares…”

Scarecrow went over to the center, over to the controls where she saw a bright, beeping light coming from one of the screens. She didn’t have so much as an idea about how this was going to blow. Will the building be going along with it? Is everyone going to live through it?

She should know. She was the one who detonated the first Cloudburst.

They were two hours away from the city. And the government already had most of the people in the area evacuate to shelters underground. They didn’t have much else to hide.

The guards around them had masks as well. They were going to sit it through, fight even with the gas all around them.

She had no idea what was going to happen. But all she could do was sit and watch.

Scarecrow pressed the final button, and on the screen, it showed a minute’s countdown

The Bullet closed her eyes.

There was a heat coming to her wrists. Out of view from the guards. A little flame, floating about. It melted away the chains that were around their hands, and suddenly, she could move them around. She looked over at Diablo and thanked him with a nod. Harley and Boomerang were free as well. Frost, on the other hand, rejected that fire and instead froze over the chains herself. They could charge.

But the guards were too many. She couldn’t just attack.

Time was running out. There was nothing they could do.

But they can shield themselves. At the last second when the guards couldn’t react.

“This is… the Cloudburst!!!”

Three.

Two.

One.

BOOM!!!

“EVERYBODY, GET YOUR FUCKING MASKS!” Boomerang screamed. The five of them grabbed their filter masks from their suits and held it against their mouths. Everything was shaking, an explosion large enough to almost take down its walls, then the glass started to break. The gas was leaking on the inside.

Scarecrow didn’t move. He just stood there, amused, all the while his guards started to panic, panting and coughing and tearing the masks off their faces like it only hurt their skin. She ran out of the way before a guard fell to her body, clutching his throat, before he started screaming the ghostliest noises a human could possibly make.

Then their skins. No longer did they look remotely human. They looked like they were burnt out. Their whole body turning into scabs and burnt flesh. The toxin was eating them from the inside. And their eyes. She’s never seen the look on someone’s face like that when they were looking straight at their deepest, darkest fears. Not even when she’d imagine it.

No.

He couldn’t possibly-

No.

These men. These trained soldiers promised with almost million dollars each.

Scarecrow didn’t hire them here to defend the Cloudburst.

They were here to serve as victims for his horrible toxin that turned them into vicious, mindless zombies. And they looked exactly like they would have in their visions of fear, the ones you’d merely hallucinate with his old toxin. This time, they weren’t hallucinations. The nightmarish creatures of the dark, Scarecrow had turned the people’s fears into something real.

The squad, with their masks on, held tightly onto their weapons, watching the horror in front of them unfold.

One of the creatures ran after Harley, so she swung at it with her mallet, crushing his body against the wall. It didn’t even look like it had human bones that cracked when it was hit.

No. No. No.

Everyone started firing at the creatures coming after them. At their heads, at their animalistic mouths. Frost on one side, freezing the incoming animals into an ice block, and on the other, El Diablo, firing at them with an enormous raging fire. They had to get out of here. There was no possible way they could win this here. Not with the Cloudburst looking like it was about to break.

The Bullet fired at everything she could see. With her AK on one hand and her pistol on the other. But the seemingly endless array of lifeless minions came crawling and pouncing right at her. One of them scratched her arm. She hoped this fucking toxin didn’t work through cross contamination.

Scarecrow, he was still at the center, watching it all unfold.

Scarecrow.

Fucking Scarecrow.

The Bullet screamed out, even with her mask, then opened fire as she made her way into the center walkway. She ran to him and pushed everything out of her way, blowing their brains out, jumping onto the railing and running on top of it. She took out a grenade and threw it at a crowd.

Jonathan Crane caught her eye. And with the deathly look on her face, he lost his amusement.

Then the coward started to back away.

She growled and tore through everything, running after Crane. He didn’t have much else to go.

So in a split second, she fired at his leg. The Bullet could have easily fired at his head.

But she wanted him to die from a bullet right between his eyes, that were to look right into hers in the last few moments of his life.

Scarecrow was on the ground, crawling. The Bullet walked right up to him and grabbed him by the collar. Then she aggressively slammed him against the glass where his horrible red toxin was leaking out.

“You killed my son…”

“You did that yourself-“

“No,” she tightened her hand around his neck. “No, I didn’t.”

A pistol. Right against his head. She ends this now. His story ends now. His reign on earth. His madness. His nightmare.

She couldn’t hear the bullet fire out of her hand.

But she did feel the blood spatter when it entered Jonathan Crane’s skull. She heard the crack, and the impact against the glass. She saw the look on his eyes, staring right into her. Taunting her. Waiting for her to pull the trigger until it stayed that way until the worms eat up his body.

The Bullet threw the body on the floor.

She was never, ever going to kill another human being again. She made that promise. To Jason and his family.

But if she were to kill just one last time…

She wanted to make it count.

-----

“Holy…”

“Shit…”

“We were too late.”

“Or the squad failed…”

“No,” Red Hood choked. “No, they can't be dead.”

“They might still be alive. Get your masks on. Come on.”

They put on their masks, Red Hood’s under his visor. As they ran towards the enormous mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke that was spewing violently out of the dome. The ground was quaking enough to feel like it would eventually erupt. And if they were to stay, it might actually split open. They ran towards the center.

And before they could go down the pit. They saw them. Right when they stepped into the are completely engulfed in the horrible red toxin.

They saw the creatures.

In army uniforms of what used to be humans, the creatures were screaming, running and clawing their way around the grass and bushes like they were rabid wolves under a full moon. The bodies, or what used to be bodies, looked like undead carcasses that were walking on their hands and feet. When they caught sight of the three, they started going after them.

Someone grabbed Nightwing’s shoulder.

Rick fucking Flag. He had a mask on.

“You kids better stay away. This is our mission.”

“You really want your boss’s goddamn pride to get in the way of actually saving the world? We’re here to help!”

Flag fired at one of the monsters coming right for them.

“Scarecrow’s baited his own men and turned them into these fucking shitbags.”

“Then let us help,” Robin said. Red Hood, on the other hand, was already shooting at the creatures with his two pistols.

“Red Hood!”

“Oh, don’t give me that! These guys aren’t human!” He fired at one almost flying for his visor. “They never will be again even if we destroy this thing! So get your asses here and KILL THESE GUYS!”

Rick Flag had went on to shoot them with his AK. Nightwing and Robin stared at each other, holding onto their escrima sticks and bo staff.

Flag, despite his guns, didn’t see one of the zombie-like monsters that had grabbed him from behind. It started tearing at its face, claws sharper than a cat’s. Robin and Nightwing went over to get it off him, but it was too late.

Rick Flag’s mask had fallen off.

He stared at the two, with his eyes glowing red and bloodshot from how he was desperately trying to hold his breath. He started clutching at his throat, and his mouth looked like it was about to blow up.

Flag couldn’t handle it. He gasped for air.

Then he turned into one of them. Right in front of their eyes. Nightwing gripped on his escrima sticks.

Then he slammed it against Flag’s head, destroying what was left of his skull. The guilt started to eat him away, but Red Hood was right. He wasn’t human anymore.

“Come on,” Robin said.

Then they attacked everything that came their way. They had to go into the dome. Find the Squad. Hope for the best. But the creatures were running out of the doors like they were in need of air. Hundreds of them in a stampede going out into the field. The trees had cleared, blown off from the explosion. Everything was barren and had fallen under a thick red cloud of his fucking toxin.

Red Hood managed to run all the way to the center. He shot one that had wrestled Nightwing to the ground before he slid down the pit, hands and legs outstretched, and even then, he continued to fire. He reloaded his guns and started firing at the ones going out of the dome.

----

They couldn’t possibly take them all.

So as the Squad rushed down the hallways, out into the first level where it had gone complete barren and destroyed, El Diablo continued to shoot his flames from his hands at all the incoming creatures.

Finally, they reached the door and they all raced outside.

Frost barred the door with her ice, as much as she could, and the monsters were pounding themselves against it with their own bodies and heads. The Bullet, facing behind them, fired at the incoming creatures that must have been the reinforcements waiting to be called. Fuck, there were a lot of them.

Killer Frost couldn’t handle it and the creatures had broken her wall of ice. Unnatural strength. One of the side effects of the toxin. Harley screamed her battle cry and started swinging her mallet around. El Diablo with his flames. And Captain Boomerang with, well, his boomerang.

The Bullet, with her machine gun, fired at ten of the creatures in under a second. She flew in the air. She dodged their incoming attacks. She fired directly at their heads and took out more of them than anyone else with a gun. She fired relentlessly until their heads were blown off, their bodies exploding onto the floor.

She climbed on top of a nearby truck, dropped her carbine, then used her wrist gun and pistol to fire at everything that moved.

“WOOHOO! GO NEW GIRL!” Harley screamed. The Bullet smiled, then went on with her alternating shots until she’d taken down dozens of them.

Everything that moved. Everything that moved. Everything that-

A red hood. Red visor. Gray jacket. And a red bat symbol on his chest.

Oh God.

The asshole.

“Jason!!!”

Red Hood turned around.

A wave that had crashed on the shore, violent and forceful, a wave that tore through everything in its way. Every tree. Every bush. Every doubting thought. The Bullet jumped off the truck, ignored the sting up her knees. She ran to him. She ran to him so fast that two of the monsters smashed into each other when they were going after her. Red Hood recognized her and dropped everything he had on him and sprinted to her way.

The wave was there. A crashing, powerful wave. When they landed in each other’s arms so painfully tight she could have almost fallen over if she hadn’t already clung to him with all her might. All that was left of it.

Yes.

Yes…

Everything lit up. Everything was here again. He was everything. He will always be everything.

It was a miracle they lived through it. Red Hood, with his arms shaking as much as the ground was, buried himself into her and didn’t let go until they heard the world calling out to them, demanding that they give them their attention back. But even then, they held on. Not when they thought it could have been the last. Not after they’ve just been apart. Jason pulled away, raised his visor so she could look into his eyes. He wore a filter mask underneath. And if he could see her smile right then, she was sure he was grinning his face off as well. She could tell with the way his beautiful eyes crinkled up.

“I fucking love the suit-“

Then she held out her arm and shot one of the monsters coming for them.

“We should move.”

“Yeah.”

Side by side, having each other’s backs. She knew something felt wrong fighting with the squad. No, she didn’t belong there. She never fought as well as she possibly could when she was with her partner. Now the Bullet and Red Hood, they fired and shot at everything that came their way.

“Throw me!” She screamed at Red Hood. She run up to him, and he grabbed her legs. Red Hood flung her up at the air and she fired relentlessly at twenty creatures hidden behind the truck. She got to the ground.

Then the fucking Batwing flew in and started firing.

“Woah!” The Bullet yelled.

“How cool is our butler!?”

The monsters started running towards the Batwing, and their attentions were slowly taken away from Red Hood and Bullet. Alfred had them covered.

“We have to get that bomb off you.”

“Where’s Flag? He’ll blow up the bomb if he sees me-“

“He’s dead. He can't blow it up. But we still need to get that off of you before Waller does it herself-”

The Cloudburst dome exploded once again, this time a thicker cloud of smoke blew out of it like a bomb. They held onto the ground, eyes shut. Red Hood grabbed onto her and she swore by her life that she was never going to let go.

When it subsided, they stood back up. “Come on.”

The Bullet stared at him dumbfounded, then the Red Hood grabbed her wrist, pulled her to the back where they could find Nightwing.

“Dick!!!”

Nightwing saw them, slammed his sticks into the creature’s guts, then ran towards them.

“I found a chair at the back. She needs to sit down.”

They moved fast. Waller will find out Flag is dead and detonate all their bombs before they’ll have a chance at escaping.

So they put her into a chair, and she gripped onto the arm rests. The Bullet watched Red Hood give Nightwing a pen-shaped device that had a needle on its end. She swallowed. “Hey, hey…” Red Hood leaned in and held her face. “You're gonna be okay… Scream if you have to… It won't take too long.”

She wished she could see his face. It was the only way she could ever be comforted. But his touch was enough. She held his hand, squeezed it, then Nightwing held her neck.

“Ready.”

Alfred kept firing at all the creatures coming after them. They had a few good minutes.

Y/N screamed out into the air as the needle went into the back of her neck and electrified that one spot by her spine. She gripped onto the wood. She forced her eyes shut. She never felt so much pain from being tased down but with it came the relief feeling that bomb actually stop beeping in the inside of her flesh. The shocks were excruciatingly painful, and it made every agonizing second pass by as long as a minute would have taken. Red Hood turned his head away before the look on her face broke his heart even more.

But the moment it stopped, with her body up in light smokes, she felt everything inside her calm.

It was gone. The bomb was gone. She could actually feel it. Red Hood grabbed her and pulled her to a hug immediately.

“You're safe now…”

“I love you.”

“I love you…”

Robin suddenly jumped at them and took out three incoming creatures with his staff. “Come on guys, Alfred can't handle all this by himself!”

Nightwing. Robin. Red Hood. Bullet.

Like they were all made to fight by each other’s side.

Nightwing smashed his weapons against a monster’s head, threw its body up in the air with his knee, then the Bullet fired at it with her wrist gun all the way down to the ground. He helped her up, gain higher ground, then she fought at Nightwing’s side when he took out the ones coming for her back. Robin, with his bo staff, slammed one right at the gut and let it fly through the air until Red Hood slammed its torso with his elbow, before shooting it in the head.

Red Hood shot three with his pistols, but one of them grabbed him by the head. And man, was it inhumanely strong. Nightwing slammed his stick right through its skull, just inches away from Red Hood’s head. Red Hood elbowed it away, then shot it. The Bullet kept covering them, now with her machine gun. She fired at one going after Robin, at another that had Nightwing in a headlock, and another two that were about to surround Red Hood.

So many were coming to surround her. And as the boys fought them off, she fired at them relentlessly with her gun. She jumped to the ground and fired at them with her wrist gun.

The Batwing was above them, swerving around as it took out everything that stood their way.

The Bullet looked back out at the pit, where the squad was. “We have to help them!” she said.

“What?!” Red Hood screamed. “Are you insane?”

“They just want to live! We all want this nightmare to end! You can go back to being enemies after we’ve saved the world!”

The world. Of course. By now the gas should have dispersed out of the state. They had to move.

The Bullet shot off a creature coming for Harley. And another coming for Boomerang. The man was barely holding up. El Diablo, now a raging monster completely made of fire, tore through everything in its way and burnt down all the monsters to a bloody crisp. Frost was still holding up, doing whatever she could with her ice. And the look on her face when Nightwing came along and hit one of them in the head before it could grab her, she couldn’t describe it.

And it was that way for hours on end. The creatures kept on coming. The fires started raging. The Batwing had landed on the ground but kept its bullets spewing out of its guns in a frenzied attack against the hundreds that were still around them.

But somehow, the dome acted as some sort of beacon. Because there were more incoming. From far away. She had no idea if they were still Scarecrow’s men or if they were people from the countryside that weren’t so lucky…

As far as everybody knew, they were dead.

And they were all going after the dome like flies surrounding a light.

Frost had them in a block of ice, then Diablo fried them up like fish. Harley kept with her hammer and almost hit Nightwing in the head. “Harley!”

“Sorry, handsome! Kinda got used to aiming for your pretty head!”

Jason, standing with his back right up against the Y/N’s side. They shot at the creatures with their guns not knowing if their ammo was going to take it.

“Y/N! You think we’re gonna make this!?”

She shot down a foot, an arm, then eventually a head. Y/N screamed. “It’s not looking good but I sure fucking hope so!”

Red Hood grabbed her shoulder and turned her around, firing at one she didn’t see. Y/N got a circular lid off one of the manholes and flung it into three bodies.

“Y/N! MARRY ME!!!”

She could have been grabbed by the head if she didn’t hear it coming from behind. She held out her wrist gun and fired directly behind her.

“I THINK I’VE ALREADY ANSWERED THAT QUESTION!!!”

Y/N used Jason’s body to haul herself up, swinging her leg in a circle around her before she shot all of them on the ground. Jason grabbed a creature’s head with his bare hands and squished it into its bloody bits.

“NO. I MEAN MARRY ME. RIGHT NOW!!!!”

“WHAT?!”

Almost losing her arm, she slammed her fist against its head, throwing it to the grass and slamming her boot onto its face. Jason kept firing with his two guns, faster than he ever could have fired.

“IF WE’RE GONNA DIE, WE’RE DYING TOGETHER!!”

“WHAT?!?!”

Jason grabbed her arms, flung her around him so she could repeatedly kick them down before they got anywhere near them. She fired her wrist gun and cursed when she almost missed. He started handling them by hand, punching, swerving, kicking them down with his awfully strong thighs.

“YOU EVER SEEN PIRATES OF THE CARRIBEAN!?” He smashed drove his gun into a skull and kicked him off. “THE THIRD ONE???”

“JASON, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!!??”

Y/N pressed her back against Jason, and they didn’t stop firing.

“THEY GOT MARRIED IN THE MIDDLE OF A FIGHT. IT WAS FUCKING EPIC.”

“WE’RE GOING TO FUCKING DIE-“

“EXACTLY MY POINT. I WANT TO GET OUT OF THIS WITH YOU AS MY WIFE. DEAD OR ALIVE. I DON’T WANNA WASTE ANYMORE TIME.”

She leapt up in a backflip over Jason and they switched places.

“THIS NEVER WOULD HAVE HAPPENED IF WALLER COULDN’T LEGALLY FORCE ME TO TESTIFY AGAINST YOU. I’M NOT ABOUT TO LET THAT HAPPEN AGAIN. IF ANYONE WANTS TO KEEP US APART, THEY’LL HAVE TO GO THROUGH THE FUCKING LAW!”

“JASON, YOU'RE INSANE!!!”

Five down in a single shot. Y/N kicked them down, grabbed her grappling gun, then shot it at a crate to haul it over to the monsters incoming. Jason went through the whole row of creatures climbing down the pit, and when he had the slightest window, he raised his visor.

“IS THAT A YES?!”

Y/N faced him. and Jason faced her.

It wasn’t even a fucking question. The beautiful asshole.

“YES!”

As they kept firing, Jason pressed on his communicator. “ALFRED!!!”

He tossed Y/N a communicator so they’d both be able to hear him. The butler was still in the batwing, needless to say still firing at all the monsters that have made a mountain coming after it hovering in the air.

“Yes, sir?”

“YOU STILL AN ORDAINED MINISTER?!”

He could hear Alfred sound confused.

“I do believe that is a lifelong thing-“

“MARRY US. RIGHT NOW!!!”

Alfred took out a bazooka gun on the Batwing, a new one no doubt. He didn’t remember Bruce having that when he was still alive, then stook out a crowd of twenty coming after him.

“I’m afraid I’m rather busy at the moment, Master Jason.”

“THEN MAKE IT QUICK. PLEASE, MARRY US!”

“TIM, YOU HEARING THIS?” Dick cried out into the comms. Everyone could hear it.

“I KNOW. IT’S FUCKING ROMANTIC.”

Alfred kept his calm. Then they heard a sigh.

“Alright. Do try not to get yourselves killed, Master Jason.”

“CAN DO!”

Y/N grabbed Jason’s arm, held onto him as tightly as she could, then they turned to meet each other’s eyes. Not after shooting a zombie coming for his back.

“Dearly beloved we are gathered here today…” Alfred fired another bazooka at the crowd. “To join this man, and this woman, in holy matrimony.”

Her wrist gun on a frenzy, she shot at the surrounding monsters and helped Jason kick one down with his knee. They stuck to each other’s backs, firing with their pistols.

“Jason Todd, Red Hood, do you take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

Jason’s pistol ran out of ammo, so Y/N threw him a magazine.

“I DO!!!”

She grabbed him, hurled him to the side so they’d switch places, then she started firing at a gun powder barrel she found and it immediately exploded.

“Y/FN Y/LN, Deadsh-“

“THE BULLET! I’M THE BULLET!”

Jason smiled at her with his eyes.

“Ah yes, I do apologize. Y/FN Y/LN, the Bullet, do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

Alfred fired at the creatures coming up to her just as she spoke. “I DO!”

Endless bullets, flying out of their hands, they fired at everything that came their way, protecting each other, shielding each other from harm’s way.

Alfred cleared his throat.

“Then with the power vested in me by the city of Gotham, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

“DICK, COVER US!”

“I GOT YOU!” Dick screamed.

“You may now kiss the bride…”

Before they’d die. Before it all ends.

They only had a minute before their lungs would give out.

So they ran into each other’s arms, taking off their masks and held their breaths to the best capacity.

Jason grabbed Y/N’s face, pulling her to his lips. Then an explosion happened in the far-off distance that blew off almost everything around them in the air. All except them.

They were one. They were together. Forever. She was his. And he was hers. For as long as they both shall live.

“IS THIS A FUCKIN’ WEDDING?!” Boomerang screamed.

Harley smashed her hammer. “I LOVE WEDDINGS!!!”

Jason leaned down and kissed her despite his chest starting to twist. She grabbed the back of his neck, pushed him back as well. Never has a kiss been more powerful, more meaningful. As far as they knew, they were alone. They were themselves. They were together. And nothing, not even the world, was ever going to pull them apart ever again.

From their first kiss in the meeting room, to the one at the Batcave, to the kiss in her quarters that one rainy night, to the kiss they shared up on that bridge. Everything had boiled down to now. Finally. Finally.

They were fucking married.

They pulled away, stared at each other, and finally they could see the largest smiles on their faces. The places the masks back on and gasped to breathe.

“Shall we?”

“We shall…”

Not a lot more to cover. The fucking monsters were finally starting to run out. And they moved in a dance only they knew. On each other’s side. Never leaving.

They shot, kicked, slammed, tore through the lifeless bodies coming after them and she cried out as another bomb exploded that she threw from her hand. She fought with her fucking husband and man, did it sound like the most beautiful thing in the world.

Nightwing and Robin came up to them.

“CONGRATULATIONS!!!” they both screamed.

“THANK YOU!”

Then Y/N handed them both guns and they started firing at the creatures.

It worked so well.

Finally.

Twenty left. Then there were fifteen. Then another ten died.

Finally.

Gone. All of the monsters. Wiped out.

The Squad was intact. Thankfully, they smiled at the Bullet and they all gathered to the center.

“I can't believe this,” Nightwing said. “But thank you for having our backs.”

“Don’t get used to it, pretty boy, when we wake up tomorrow mornin’ I’m back to slicing your head off with a-“

“Okay,” Red Hood stopped them. “Now we have to figure out a way to stop this.” He pointed up at the beacon.

“Hood,” the Bullet gulped.

“Yes, wife?”

A few of them groaned at that. Red Hood ignored them.

But the Bullet, Y/N, she didn’t look to happy.

She was staring right up at the top of the pit, shivering.

Everyone looked back to what she was looking at.

No.

No…

It wasn’t possible.

Hundreds more. Hundreds of the creatures. From all over the city. Ones with long, blonde hair. Ones that were as tiny as a small child.

It had reached civilization.

No. they couldn’t possibly handle all of them.

Robin looked at Nightwing, whose look on his eyes definitely lost that glimmering enthusiasm that sparked the hope they needed to go on.

And Red Hood.

Well, he made the right choice marrying her.

Jason held Y/N’s hand, and she took it so tightly between her fingers.

The look on their eyes, watching each other, memorizing the looks on their eyes before they go on to their inevitable deaths.

They couldn’t even see each other’s faces.

Harley slumped to the ground. “Well, this is it, ladies and gents.”

Frost screamed in frustration, releasing a large block of ice and slamming it onto the pit.

The monsters had surrounded them now. All in a complete circle. Trapping them.

And they took their time watching them squirm like worms in a tank full of fish.

This is how they die.

Y/N tightened her grip on Jason’s hand when one of the monsters roared and they all started crawling down to the dome.

“T-Tim?”

Their communicators. It sounded like Barbara.

“Yeah?”

“I hope you weren’t saving that favor for anything special,” Oracle said.

“Favor?”

“You know. That favor with Bruce’s friends…”

“What do you mea-“

Like a lightning bolt striking a tree, their eyes shot up at the brightest flash of light.

A golden, glimmering lasso, coming down from something they hadn’t seen flying in the air. The lasso grabbed onto five of the incoming beings and hauled them up.

Y/N’s never seen her up close.

But goddamn, she was nothing like the pictures.

Wonder Woman slammed against the ground on her knee and her balled up fist, letting the soil ripple at her impact. She didn’t have on a mask, but it barely wrinkled her nose. Her striking beauty was made even more obvious when she smirked up at the four, standing up, then took out her shield and sword from her back. She winked at them.

The four were too dumbfounded to move. As victims exhausted or as fanboys and fangirls watching it all unfold right in front of their eyes. Boom tubes coming from different parts in the air, and out of those circles came the heroes they’ve looked up to their whole lives.

Superman tore through a whole row of that were crawling after them with his powerful laser vision, flying through the sky faster than any of Y/N’s bullets could speed through. He grabbed one by the head, flew up to the sky, then threw it against the ground so hard that dozens of others blew up along with it.

Green Lantern made his own machine gun with his ring. He fired at everything that came close to the dome.

The Flash couldn’t even be seen. All they could see was a buzzing red light, powering all around them in circles and taking down everything that was in his path.

Green Arrow started raining down more than five arrows at a time. Ones from above. Ones from the ground. Black Canary ran up from behind them and let out that famous ear-piercing scream that took out everything that was in front of her. Even the grass.

Aquaman came up with his trident, and with Mera following behind, she let a stream of water pierce through the air like shards and a fucking shark was in it eating the heads of everything the water passed through.

Hawkgirl held her mace up in front of her and let her wings force her through the hundreds in the crowd, smashing their brains out with a single hit.

Shazam slammed on the ground, with sparks coming out of his body, then he screamed at the sky and let the biggest lightning bolt they’ve ever seen clear out a whole patch of the land the beings were standing on.

Martian Manhunter transformed into his true alien form then grabbed the monsters with his bare hands, threw them out of the way, and stomped on them with his feet. Or what looked like feet.

Cyborg. Supergirl. Zatanna. Doctor Fate. Huntress. Hawkman. Vixen. The Atom.

They were all here.

They were all going to live.

The fucking Justice League had come to save them.

Never have they seen them all in action. To them, it might have just been another day. But to them? To Batman’s wards. It was everything they ever wished to become.

It was the best, most beautiful thing they could possibly see their whole lives.

Bruce. How much he would have loved this.

Then the ground started to shake once again. The Cloudburst. It let out another load of the toxin.

They had to destroy it now.

Alfred hovered the Batwing above them and opened up the entry way. He waved his hands for them to come in. Robin, Nightwing, Red Hood, and Bullet ran into the Batwing and took their masks off.

“We can't just run off.”

“We have to go help them.”

“Actually,” Alfred said. “I’ve taken instruction from Ms. Prince.”

“She wanted us to leave?”

“No.” Alfred lead them to the windows and the looked out.

Superman, Green Lantern, Cyborg, and Supergirl were all facing the top of the dome, firing their lasers at the concentrated spot at the center. The heart of the Cloudburst. The whole building had gone up in flames, but it continued to fire up in the toxin.

“The Batwing has one more rocket bomb in its ammunition. When the League has the Cloudburst’s core exposed, we only have one shot at firing right at its center, destroying the Cloudburst for good.”

“I’ll do it,” Dick said.

“No I will!” Tim cried.

“Who said it was your turn!?”

“Who said it was yours?!”

“This isn’t a fucking argument, this is the world’s fate in our hands!”

“Exactly, which means I get to fire the Batwing.”

“Well, who exactly has the best aim in this fucking ship-“

Every pair of eyes stopped wandering around. Then they turned to the woman they called the Bullet.

No.

Fucking no.

“I can't-“

“Y/N-“

“Jason, I can't do this-“

“You can.”

“I don’t trust myself-“

“You never miss-“

“Jason.”

She grabbed his hands that were holding her face, finally she could look up at his eyes and see his lips in a smile.

“The last time I handled a tank, it was the Cloudburst… and I missed.”

“It doesn’t matter. That wasn’t your fault. You have no idea how sorry I am for being upset at that, but I know you can do this. Besides, this isn’t a tank. This is the fucking Batwing.”

“Jay…”

“Please. You're the only one who can do this.”

“I’ve never handled anything like this before.”

“You. Can. Do this.”

Looking up at Jason’s eyes, she saw just how much hope he had for her. Then he leaned in and kissed her.

“Man, is he dramatic today,” Tim said.

“Shut up, they just got married.”

When Jason pulled away, the heaviness in Y/N’s chest had slowly started to fade.

Yeah. He was right.

Her husband was right.

She does have the best aim in the room.

Alfred gestured for her to take the seat at the cockpit. And with Jason holding her hand, leading her to the front, she slowly took the front seat.

Everything was at her control. It didn’t look too intimidating. She pressed onto the buttons and breathed in. Really breathed in.

Breathe. Breathe.

Jason stood back, but not without squeezing her shoulder.

Breathe.

She opened her eyes.

Flying the Batwing over to the top of the dome, right alongside Superman and Supergirl with their lasers still pointing at the center. It won't be long now.

Everything looked brighter. Everything felt hotter. The center of the Cloudburst, at the dome that was once its protective shield.

Irony. She always thought it was what’s going to get her.

Driving the Cloudburst, using it to take down the Batmobile.

Now she was driving the Batwing to take down the Cloudburst.

Yes. Irony certainly did come out to bite her.

But it was in the fucking best way possible.

Doctor Fate and Zatanna had joined in and fired their magical beams at the same spot at the center. Slowly, after each second that passed, she could see its shield slowly start to fade away. A ball around the glass tank of the toxin collapsed. And finally, it was seconds away from its very heart exposed.

Breathe.

The Bullet turned on her optics.

Further. Closer. Brighter.

NOW.

The rocket shot through the Batwing’s bazooka and it came flying out into the air. She waited for that half a millisecond watching it fall to the very spot she aimed at.

Everyone flew out of the sky before it landed on the Cloudburst.

Then the entire dome exploded like a massive nuclear bomb tearing out into the sky with its violently flying debris. The Justice League and the Suicide Squad had cleared out, and with the explosion it took away all the remaining nightmare creatures, dissolving them into the air as nothing but ash.

Everything was loud. Everything was bright. They shielded their eyes away before it blinded them and hid as the dome continued to explode.

They were so high up in the air that they could see the stars up in space despite it already the morning.

And as the bombing sounds had faded…

So did the toxin.

The once red cloud that had covered the sky had dwindled away to its natural white. Everything fell down in beautiful pink ashes. The same ones from when Ivy destroyed the first Cloudburst. They looked up at the sky, and with tears down their faces, everyone leapt in joy and cheered when everything looked as peaceful as it once was.

On the ground where the dome used to be, a crater of soil was left behind. No more creatures. No more darkness. No more Scarecrow.

Everyone took off their domino masks and visors. Dick took Tim and they screamed in happiness, jumped in the air, hugged each other until it hurt like girls at a sleepover. They took Alfred in as well and gave him the biggest bear hug there was.

“DID YOU FUCKING SEE THAT, BABE!?” Tim said into his comms.

Babs was just as ecstatic as they were. “I’M SO PROUD OF ALL OF YOU!!”

“WE FUCKING SAVED THE WORLD!!!” Dick leapt for joy.

“I THOUGHT WE WERE GONNA DIE OUT THERE.”

“I KNOW. THEN FUCKING WONDER WOMAN CAME IN AND DESTROYED EVERYTHING I MEAN HOW CAN ANYONE GET AS AWESOME AS THAT?!”

“YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THE LOOK ON YOUR FACE,” Tim screamed. “IT’S LIKE YOU SAW HER AT FUCKING COMIC CON.”

“ALFRED.” They pulled him in. “TELL ME. DID BRUCE EVER DO ANYTHING LIKE THAT IN HIS LIFE?!”

“Well, other than the ten times he’s defeated Darkseid over at outer space, no I don’t think he has.”

“ WE STILL WIN. WE FUCKING DID IT!!!”

“JASON, DID YOU SEE IT WHEN GREEN LANTER- Jason?!”

They looked around. Jason hadn’t joined them in their little celebration.

Jason and Y/N were over at the back, kissing for what seemed to have been the last ten minutes and completely ignoring everything that went on around them. She was holding his face, and he was hugging her waist. Didn’t even stop when Tim cleared his throat.

Dick, on the other hand, had went up to one of the compartments and had grabbed a bottle of champagne they had stored there for purposes like this.

“Can't believe we almost forgot. CONGRATULATIONS TO THE NEWLYWEDS !!!”

Everyone in the Batwing clapped for joy and the couple finally stopped kissing, turning their heads over to smile at them.

“THIS CALLS FOR A CELEBRATION!”

“CHAMPAGNE FOR EVERYONE.”

Jason thumbed her cheek. “You alright with our reception being held in the Batwing?”

Y/N shrugged. “I mean, I wanted to book a caterer, but-“

Jason pulled her face again and kissed her with their hearts light and their spirits so high up in the sky.

A future. She could see it. It was all flashing in front of her eyes now.

Finally, something good had happened out of the series of darkness.

They drank, cheered, partied in the Batwing while it went in a really slow autopilot on its way back to the cave. They hung out like any group of friends would have. Like any family would have.

Jason held her hand the whole time. And Y/N held it even tighter.

This was the end. And it was beautiful, peaceful, promising.

And above all else, it was fucking epic.

-----

EPILOGUE

As if the world hadn’t already stopped surprising them, they continued to go through that very same day bringing them almost to the brink of a heart attack.

When the grounds to the Batcave descended, when the Batwing parked itself in its spot, when its entryway folded down for them all to walk down to, everyone was still in their high, laughing, skipping when they walked down the ramp and out into the walkway.

“Babs!”

Barbara wheeled right towards them and Tim held her in his arms, pulling her up to his level so he could carry her. They all cheered.

“I can't believe you thought of calling the League!”

Babs laughed. “Obviously, you needed help.”

Everyone started talking at the same time, each of them telling Babs one side of the story and how it happened. Explaining in detail how Wonder Woman did this and how Aquaman did that. Even Y/N was so excited she couldn’t stop talking about how Green Arrow’s aim was something she’d admired for so long. A bubble of noise, happy noise. Kids being together.

Like no time even passed. They continued on and on about everything that happened.

Then Jason looked behind at the computers. He stopped talking. His smile faded away. His heart stopped. His whole body stopped.

Everyone saw the look on his face and turned to look at what he was seeing.

At first, he looked just about as regular as any tall man.

And if you hadn’t been expecting it, like practically everyone in the room didn’t, no one would believe it at first glance.

Black shirt. Basic jeans. A jacket over his shoulders. Hair so long it had gone down to his neck pushed back.

But it was him. So undeniably him.

“Oh my god…” Babs whispered.

Bruce Wayne smiled at all their faces. Jaws on the ground. Eyes so incredibly wideset. He didn’t look the least bit bothered.

He walked on over closer to them, hands in his pockets. He stood a few yards away so as to not startle them.

His children.

“Dick…” he greeted.

The eldest choked on his breath. “Bruce…”

Bruce looked over at the girl with fiery red hair.

“Barbara…”

“Oh. My. God.”

Bruce grinned, then he looked over at the man beside her.

“Tim…”

“You're alive…” Tim breathed.

Then when Bruce met Jason’s eyes, everyone parted to give him his way. Bruce started walking towards him, and Jason swallowed on his tongue.

He hadn’t prepared for this.

Not by a long shot.

He thought he was never, ever going to see him again.

He never thought he’d have the chance to make things right.

And now, he did.

Bruce stood in front of Jason.

“Welcome back…” Bruce said. “My son…”

Jason pulled him into a hug, much to Bruce’s surprise. Much to everyone’s surprise.

But he wanted to skip all the thinking and the doubts and the holding back to everything he’s ever wanted to say to him.

Jason forgave him. Already after two years. And it meant so much that Bruce had forgiven him too.

Bruce hugged him back.

Bruce never hugs anyone back.

But he patted Jason’s shoulder and held him as tightly as any father could possibly hold his son. Jason was crying. Hell, everyone in the room was crying. Even Alfred was shedding a tear. Everyone watched on as they fell into each other’s embrace longer than they’ve had with anyone else.

Eventually, Bruce had to pull away.

“I’m so sorry…” Jason cried.

Bruce held his shoulders.

“Jason…” he said. “You have no idea how proud I am of you…”

Jason realized he’s never heard those words before.

He hugged him again, just because he couldn’t hold it back anymore. Y/N dried her tears with her shirt and met Jason’s eyes from over Bruce’s shoulder.

“Bruce…” Jason pulled away. “There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

Y/N stood straight up. She dusted off her suit. She straightened her neck.

“This is Y/N,” Jason said with his hand on her back. She stretched out her hand, and Bruce took it.

“I’ve heard of you. Your girlfriend-“

“Wife.”

Her smile was so beautiful when he said it.

“My wife.”

Bruce shot up his eyebrows. “I see. Well, it would have been better if we had a talk-“

“Don’t. Do that.”

“I’m kidding,” Bruce laughed.

Y/N cleared her throat. “Such a pleasure to meet you, sir.”

“Y/N… I know who you are and who you were…”

“Bruce…”

He nodded at Dick.

“You were the Commander of the militia army. You were Deadshot. You took over your uncle’s old jobs.”

“Bruce, you don’t have to-“

He didn’t even look at Jason’s direction.

“And you drove the Batwing today…”

Y/N was scared shitless shivering on her own two feet. It wasn’t because she was talking to Batman, someone she almost had killed. It was because she was talking to her freaking father in law.

Jason swallowed.

“And I also happen to know… that you worked with my sons like a perfectly trained team and singlehandedly saved thousands of lives…”

Everyone’s eyes lit up. Especially hers.

“What do we call you now?”

“The Bullet,” she swallowed. “I’m the Bullet.”

“Well, Y/N,” he smiled. “The Bullet.”

Then he stretched out his hand.

“Welcome to the family.”

-----

MASTERLIST

THE BULLET MASTERLIST

-----

TAGLIST

@everyartistwas-firstanamateur

@sarcasmismyfirstlove

@damned-queen-of-gotham

@idkmanicantenglish

@wunderstell

@birdy-bat-writes

@get-loki

@everyday-imfangirling

@comic-nerd-dc

@multifandoms916

@icequeen208

@offendedfishnoises

@egdolan

@xemiefx

@arkhamtoddler

@elsenthal

@mythicbitchx

@supremehaunter

@lucy-roo

@roseangel013bf

@loxbbg

@reclusive-chicken-nugget

@l-inkage

@http-cherries

@shadowsndaisies

@river9noble

@zphilophobiaz

@annoylinglyaries

@knightfall05x

@flowersgirl02

@hyp-oh-critical

@satan-s-ass

#Jason todd #jason todd x reader #jason todd reader insert #arkham knight #arkham knight x reader #arkhamverse #suicide squad #floyd lawton #deadshot #the bullet #the bullet series #batarella

149 notes · View notes

magma-cjay · 4 years ago

Text

Lingering Fragments (cw: death, angst, implied suicide)

(foreword: ok MagmaCjay, you asked for it, don't say you weren't warned)

○○○○○○○○○○○○○

They were all dead. Every single one of them.

With great effort Risotto staggered toward the headquarters, limping painfully, his right leg dragging, and barely attached to his body by Metallica's power alone. Torn nearly off and barely hanging on by a few strands of muscle and tendon, and the ability of his Stand.

He had barely escaped his encounter with the unassuming young boy. A boy whom he knew had ties to the Boss. Who had mistreated him and his team for far too long. Who he was a fool to have underestimated. But he was lucky to escape with his life. Especially when Bucciarati's team intervened.

If one can consider me lucky, by any definition, Risotto thought.

His whole team was gone. He was the last man standing. The rest of his men, his family, slaughtered like swine by Bucciarati's team, and for what? Hadn't they sought to betray the boss as well? Hadn't they sought the same goal? Weren't they two teams on enemy sides, yet united with a common enemy?

It was all so damn unfair.

It wasn't long until Risotto neared the Hitman Squad hideout, a small, shabby and unassuming apartment that lay secluded in the Italian suburbs. A place where he and his crew dealt their shady deals to survive and hid from the wrath of the Boss. A place that was what many would call the dark, ominous underground of Italy's streets, but was a shelter for his men and himself.

A place that was the closest thing he could call a home.

Barging into the door, blood pouring from his numerous wounds, Risotto stumbled painfully into the living room with a cry of anguish. A cry that echoed through the empty halls of the hideout and gradually warbled away into silence. A painful, deafening silence that hurt Risotto far more than Aerosmith's bullets ever could.

He collapsed heavily onto the kitchen table, breathing heavily and wincing in pain. His dark inky eyes darted down onto the table, which was empty, save for a newspaper, and a plate of long-stale crackers, which were beginning to attract ants from their time left unattended.

Risotto's heart sank like lead as the gravity of what those meant struck him harder than any blow from the Boss's stand. The newspaper was spread out at a crossword puzzle, the date: April 1st, 2001. Risotto wished this was all a fool's day trick, but the silence was all too real. All too agonizing to endure.

The crossword puzzle was half-finished, with angry scribbles and incorrect answers that Risotto recalled too well. Of the angry hollers of Ghiaccio, as he struggled to comprehend words, while Formaggio mocked him playfully for his incompetence while snacking on the table.

Now the remnants of Formaggio's last meal lay untouched, as if silently awaiting their consumer. But there was none. Once wise-cracking, prank-pulling, now just a charred, cold corpse on a street somewhere. Would he at least be laid to rest by whoever found his body? thought Risotto. Or would he be left to rot, be picked away by rats and roaches like garbage? Like the garbage he had always been treated as, by the world, by society, by the very gang they had found themselves trapped in?

The unfinished crossword puzzle also brought Risotto little comfort. He had always loathed Ghiaccio's rambling, his angry ranting at the most trivial of things. But now Risotto ached for that irate voice. He would have given anything to hear that voice one last time. Not that Ghiaccio's throat, pierced right through the spine and out his windpipe, drowned slowly in his own blood by Giovanna and his gunman, would ever make another sound again.

Risotto glared at the crossword puzzle, and the one word that Ghiaccio had managed to fill. "An eight letter word synonymous with forever."

Eternity.

Eternity. How painfully appropriate. Gone for eternity, never to be seen or heard from again. Forever. Just like the only family he ever had, with this one word, inked out in a sanguine red on the faded parchment, as if an ominous tiding of death.

The sight of these leftovers were too much for Risotto to bear, and despite the agony he heaved himself off the kitchen chair, stumbling to the living room and throwing himself onto the couch. His blood stained the faded, torn cushions, as he pressed his face into a pillow and muffled a scream. He breathed in through his nose, and caught a waft of a familiar scent. Prosciutto's cologne. His favorite pefume that he wore before...that mission. Risotto felt a lump in his throat.

Everywhere he looked, everywhere he went, the house was filled with little remains of everyday things, which like nails further hammered in the loss in his already wounded heart and soul. Scents. Sights. Sounds, or the lack thereof.

His knee accidentally pressed something hard on the sofa and with a static whirr the television came on. It was a dramatic soap opera currently on air. Melone and Illuso's favorite television show, featuring soppy tales of love and romance which they dutifully watched day after day, despite mocking jabs from Formaggio and Ghiaccio about their tastes in genre.

And now they will never know how the show ends. The last he had heard of Melone was a report from Ghiaccio claiming to have heard him scream on the phone and lose contact. And Illuso...was gone. Not just dead, but gone: vanished without a trace, melted into thin air, with not even a hair or piece of clothing to remind the world that he ever was.

Would anyone remember them? Would anybody even care?

They were just criminals to the world, weren't they? The scum of the earth, filthy, cold-blooded killers. They were the monsters of society, and to anyone else? They'd say they deserved to die.

But to Risotto, they were family. His family. His brothers in a way, who were all dragged in this horrid life by the cruel twists of fate. He'd wished to have escaped from the trappings of this mafia, but they were mired too deep into the quicksands of crime. He regretted deep inside having turned them into this life of a gangster. Especially Pesci. He was too young, too naive. He never deserved a life like this. He never deserved to see his big brother crushed under the wheels of a locomotive, and be torn apart alive shortly after by that damn Bucciarati's stand to spend his final moments in pain and terror at the cold, freezing abyss of a lake.

He despised himself at not having been able to save them. Of having failed to free them from the binds of this miserable existence. But it was too late. Since the day Sorbet and Gelato befell their dreadful end, he swore that he would lose no more further. But he did. One by one. And every single day, Risotto returned to find his home a little bit emptier.

Until there was none.

He was all alone in this cold, cruel, void, everyone he had ever cared about but a distant memory or a pallid lifeless corpse. There was nothing left for him. No one to turn to. Not even Formaggio's uplifting cracking jokes or Prosciutto's affectionate reassurance. He hated Giovanna and his allies for everything they did. If he could, he wanted to take their lives with his own bare hands, make them pay for the pain they wrought. But what would it bring him? Satisfaction? Justice?

There is no justice in this wretched world, Risotto thought bitterly. That's why I am here in the first place.

He could murder Giovanna and Bucciarati and the Boss for all he cared, but the damage was already done. Nothing he could do would bring back his family. They were dead, gone forever, and all of his efforts would have been in vain.

There was nothing left for him, but a future of emptiness.

Why did he have to suffer? What did he do to deserve all this? They were bad people who did bad things, but it wasn't their fault they were forced to become what they were. Risotto whimpered like a frightened child as he curled up on the bloodstained sofa, embracing himself tightly in a futile effort to make the pain go away, the pain of his body's wounds, and the agony that seared his soul like hellfire.

He wanted the pain to end.

A gleam caught his eye, down next to the sofa. Something black and shiny lay tucked against one side of the cushions It was Prosciutto's spare revolver, which he kept in good condition, and kept hidden away in case his original was lost or damaged if a mission went wrong.

It couldn't have gone more wrong.

Everything had gone wrong.

Their entire life had gone wrong.

With trembling hands and heaving breath Risotto reached out for the revolver and felt its cold, hard steel touch menacingly, and yet enticingly, to his stiff, shivering fingers.

Maybe this would make the pain go away.

For eternity.

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○

(afterword: yeah, told you this would get really depressing. i didn't know if Risotto would kill himself or choose to continue living, in which case he would just suffer all the more so yeah i never made a chapter two. oh well. sorry all you squadra fans for making you cry today)

#jjba #jjba part 5 #la squadra #tw death #tw suicide implication #okay first of all let me just-#*SOBS*#you are a talented writer and have too much power #holy shit #my heart wrenches now #thanks you weren't joking #submission

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hephs-thighs · 4 years ago

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Let’s be real about two things: The betrayal-then-regret arcs of both Booker and Copley are the weakest aspects of The Old Guard’s story, and Booker feeling sad in no way mitigates the seriousness of his betrayal.

I've got no real beef with the betrayal arcs motivating the plot because something has to and it’s more interesting than just an Evil CEO being the source of all problems all on his own. I’m still going to criticize them for being illogical and uncommitted.

On Copley: His arc mainly makes me roll my eyes because he has the audacity to go all Pikachu Face Of Surprise when what he’s been plotting to make happen for the whole movie is exactly what happens. He explicitly knew The Old Guard would be violently captured and submitted to nonconsensual medical testing. After Joe and Nicky were captured, he also knew Merrick was both sadistic and intending to never free them. He still proceeded to capture Andy too. The only thing that was a surprise was Andy’s mortality, and you can’t tell me he values mortal life highly when he sacrificed a dozen people for footage of The Old Guard resurrecting. His regret is made even more ridiculous with the fact that he’s not only aware but obsessed with all the good The Old Guard does by being free and out there in the world.

On Booker: If he wanted a Suicide Serum, he could’ve just gone to Merrick himself. Betraying the team was completely unnecessary. It’s that simple, it’s just a weak point in the writing, let’s move on.

Booker does not deserve the team’s forgiveness. If someone tries to condemn you to unending captivity and torment, that’s not a person you should welcome back into your life. No matter how mentally ill they are. Booker’s serious emotional pain is worthy of our empathy, he’s suffering and only sees one possible end to that suffering, but that motive doesn’t make his acts any less reprehensible (or any more pardonable) than if he were after money or power. He considered his friends’ freedom and safety something he had the right to trade away for his own gain. He and Copley also took the lives of dozens of mercenaries and guards - oh their lives don’t count, you say, they were clearly irredeemably evil and deserved to die for participating in this terrible thing. But uh, so were Booker and Copley. They came up with the terrible thing.

Here’s a take I haven’t seen anyone else floating yet: There’s no real evidence Booker regrets his betrayal. Like Copley, he’s only opposed to what’s happening when Andy’s mortality is revealed. I think his apology to her is for causing her to die imminently or to die eventually in captivity. He’s still justifying his actions to Joe when they’re both strapped to dissection tables. I think in that moment, he would have preferred their captivity and testing to continue. Because other than Andy’s mortality, it’s exactly what he wanted. The team being hurt and upset with him wasn’t an unexpected part of the plan.

I think in reality he must feel bad about what he did to the team, at least eventually or on some level. But all he actually says on the matter later is that the team can’t really decide to punish him because they can’t kill him. He expected and accepted time alone as punishment, but he doesn’t act repentant. Or express any repentance on screen other than continuing to look like as much of a sad sack as he did at the start of the movie.

Here’s where I betray myself from three paragraphs ago: The team has to forgive Booker, and I don’t think they should have sent him away.

Because this isn’t reality with real relationships, it’s a story. Fate/destiny has a very clear influence in The Old Guard’s world, and the characters’ surety in that is only increasing. Booker is meant to be with them. They need space and time away from him, and they shouldn’t trust him to know where they sleep at night, lest he call another Pharma SWAT Squad down upon them, but isolating him for a century is only going to worsen his mental illness and make him care even less about them. Their hard feelings may have lessened in 100 years, but they’d be bringing back someone even less trustworthy than before.

Booker being made to suffer more does nothing to address the issues behind his actions, and it does nothing to make amends to the rest of the team. I know I’m far from the only one saying it: Booker needs therapy. Lots of it. Group therapy for the team too. If they want to be collectively safe and sane, they need to work through their problems, not just “move past” them. Okay I’m done.

#The Old Guard #Booker #joe x nicky #kaysanova #(Look I'm using the JoeNicky tags because that's where most of this fandom lives please excuse me.)#TOG Booker #TOG Discourse #Booker bashing #I mean I would call it Booker Describing Accurately but it's the same thing #andromache the scythian #yusuf al kaysani #nicolo di genova #nile freeman #sebastian le livre

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objection-argumentative · 4 years ago

Text

Soulmates Part 8

This part is NFSW

Any feedback will be greatly appreciated

Enjoy

Masterlist!

"Andrew, why are you here?" Kelsey was stunned at the older man. "I have come to bring you home in time for our wedding. I know you haven't been home since you were sixteen, but I planned a big white wedding for you. I thought it would be romantic as you like shit like that." The whole room was stunned in silence. You could hear a pin drop; it was that quiet. Andrew took an opportunity to grab Kelsey by the arm and try and pull her out of the building.

Rafael mind caught up with the scene in front of him. He pulled Kelsey to him, making Andrew lose grip of his soulmate's arm. "young man, I know you think you love this girl, but if you know what's best for her, you will let her go. I paid for this little number when she was eight years old. After years of waiting, it's time to cash in my investment."

Rafael snarled at the man." Suppose you think that my soulmate is returning to England to marry someone old enough to be her grandad, your more senile than you think. Now leave her alone, or I will have you arrested for assault and attempted kidnap of an NYPD detective." The older man looked between the couple, watching Kelsey cling to Rafael, causing his suit to crumple in her fists. "Fine, I will leave" Andrew grabbed Kelsey's chin and forced her to look into his eyes, "but this isn't over by a long shot, princess." Before Rafael could say anything to Andrew, he was already in the lift leaving. Kelsey ran towards the cribs and slammed the metal door.

"what the fuck was that Barba" nick was grinning like it was Christmas. Rafael glared at the packed room. Span on his heels and hurried towards the cribs and opened the door. The sight in front of him broke his heart. Kelsey was sitting in the corner hunched over herself, crying into her lap. Rafael bolted straight to the weeping girl "hush baby; it's ok, he has gone." The man scooped Kelsey up, sat down on one of the bunks and held her close. "I'm not going to let anyone or anything hurt you, baby, I promise. The vulnerable woman melted into her soulmate. "Wanna talk about it, baby?" Kelsey shook her head. Rafael kissed the crown of her head, letting her know that she was safe with him.

After what felt like hours, Kelsey stopped crying into the chest of her soulmate. Her body fell into complete exhaustion; her eyes were stinging; her head was pounding, and she didn't have any energy. Kelsey buried her face into the lawyer's neck. "I'm sorry for all the fuss. I know you didn't sign up for any of this." Rafael started rubbing soothing circles into the detectives back. "Dulce, dulce chica, you have done nothing to apologize for. We will get through this together." Kelsey nodded against the older man's neck. They sat for a good while longer, Rafael comforting kelsey, making sure she was ready to go back to the squad.

Kelsey detached herself from the man and stood between his legs and rested her hands on his shoulders. "Thank you, darling, for making me feel better" kelsey placed a kiss on his lips, stroked his cheek and smiled. "I'm going to have a shower ill see you in the bullpen for the update." Kelsey kissed the man again, moaning when his tongue slipt into her mouth. Rafael pulled away and smirked when he heard the girl whine at the loss of contact. "Go get ready baby, I will see you soon," Rafael walked out of the room to give the girl her space to get ready.

Twenty minutes later, Kelsey was sat at the desk in the bullpen. She was freshly showered, hair tied back into a "mum" bun, fresh her face was free of makeup, and she wore the new suit Rafael brought her. The whole squad was there, excluding their ADA. Cragen was explaining that there will be a partner move around. Kelsey is partnered up with Carisi. Sonny smiled at Kelsey and placed a hand on her shoulder "don't worry, doll. I have your back." Amanda glared at the pair.

Rafael walked into the bullpen. Watching Carisi touch Kelsey's shoulder sparked jealousy in his body. It was scaring him the bond was getting more robust; he didn't know much about what happens within the bond. He decided that his aubella was right; the couple did need to speak to a specialist of bonds, the couple needed to know what would happen in the bond and with themselves. He stopped watching the blonde detective from her desk, picked up the two coffee cups and made his way over to the squads brief.

He placed the large paper cup in front of her as he sat in the seat next to her. Unconsciously kelsey threaded her hand into Rafael's as the captain briefed the squad on the suicide of Katie Junave. "let me get this straight, Katie is rushed to hospital over a failed suicide attempt. She hears her mother talking with an NYPD detective about her ordeal. She then sneaks into the dispensary and overdoes on powerful pain killers and is found by nurses as the NYPD detective sits with an over-emotional mother." Finn quizzed, making sure he heard correctly. The whole squad faced Kelsey. "I know I should have paid more attention to the room, but Emily Junave was a wreck. But I made a Judgement call. I thought the doctors were taking care of Katie, and I put her mother first." Kelsey lowered her head and eyes, not wanting to see the judgement looks of her new team and bosses.

"Where was your partner Hardy?" Elliot quizzed, looking between the two blondes "Jessie needed me. I asked Hardy to fly solo; I needed to be with my little girl." The whole squad and the ADA were staring at Rollins, and it made her feel nervous. Rollins knew she had done wrong; she knew that kelsey shouldn't have gone to the call independently, but she didn't care. She and Jessie made cupcakes and watched frozen together-mother daughter time was well needed last night. "Rollins a word, now!" Rafael seethed as he walked over to one of the side rooms.

*That evening*

Kelsey sat with her legs stretched on her couch watching trashy tv. She wore leggings and a crop top with no bra. She reached over to grab her cup off the coffee table when Joanne came out of her room." Where is mister perfect tonight? Got a hot date with someone else" Joanne raised an eyebrow as Kelsey giggled. "No, he has a hot date with his work. Special victims Unit have four open cases, Meaning he is slammed with work." Kelsey sighed as she got up off the couch and flipped through the takeaway menu. "Fancy anything in particular tonight?" Joanne shook her head but pointed to the pizza menu. She nodded and placed the usual order of a large cheese pizza with Ginos.

Kelsey looked at her phone screen to make sure that she hadn't missed any communication from Rafael. She sighed when she realized she hadn't. Kelsey suddenly was not hungry anymore. The girl told her friend to put her pizza on top of the oven when it came, and she would get it later. Kelsey made her way to her bedroom. She turned on the lamp and plugged her phone into charge as she got into bed. Kelsey scrolled through social media for a little while. When she stumbled upon Lucia's Facebook page, she could not help her self but look. On his mother's Facebook page was holiday photos of her and her family, including Rafael. They were all enjoying a tropical climate sunbathing in the images.

There was one image of Rafael that kelsey couldn't stop looking at; he looked perfect. He was sat on a white plastic chair with the biggest smile on his face with a drink in hand. He had very short but tight swimming trunks on; Rafael's body was heavily tanned from sitting in the sun. Kelsey could feel herself getting turned on by the image; she groaned in frustration and tossed the phone to her side.

She felt her hand slide down her leggings. She felt how wet she was for her soulmate; Kelsey whimpered at the contact on her sensitive clit as she slowly worked figures of eight with the nub. She started to work her clit a little faster, arching her back in the process. she began to build her orgasm up, moving more quickly on her clit as her left hand tweaked her left nipple under her crop top. Kelsey was about to cum from the most intense orgasm when Kelsey heard her door open. She was like a deer caught in headlights; her eyes flew open.

Kelsey's body froze as the door opened and revealed Rafael. "Jesus baby, I'm sorry I should have called" before he could finish his sentence, Kelsey jumped up off the bed. "Rafi, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you, I'm sorry, so so sorry, darling. It won't happen again" Rafael shook his head and pulled the girl into his chest. "Don't you dare apologize, baby. You never apologize to anyone for your pleasure. You looked like a heavenly sin baby. I wish I didn't interrupt you." he kissed her forehead and rubbed her back "what were you thinking about, baby?" kelsey sighed and closed her eyes, feeling embarrassment creeping up on her. she grabbed her phone and showed her soulmate the image of himself.

Rafael's eyes went dark and primal "you didn't cum, did you?" Kelsey looked at the floor and shook her head. Rafael lifted her face kelsey looked at the man in front of her "you are perfect, dulce chica, never shy away. You have no reason to. Please let me help you feel good. Let me make you cum, baby?" Kelsey was awestruck. Here was a man that was so perfect he made an angel look average. "Yes darling, I want you," kelsey whispered. Rafael growled, "If you want to stop at any point, say the word, and it stops immediately." kelsey nodded her head.

Rafael hungrily kissed the blonde woman. He moved from her lips to her neck down to her collar bone. The small whimpering noises coming from Kelsey's mouth is like music to his ears. He made his way back to her mouth and tugged off her top, revealing her breasts." Fuck baby. I didn't expect you to be braless dulce chica." His thumbs skim over her light pink nipples. "Rafi, please, I need you", she whispers in a breathy moan. The older man chuckles with the glint, "Anything for you, baby." The older man stripped the leggings off Kelsey and laid her down on the bed.

"You still ok with this, dulce chica?" Rafael rubbed his index finger in Kelsey's folds, feeling how wet she was for him. Kelsey nodded her head vigorously. "Please, darling, I need you." Rafael used his mouth and tongue to draw circles over Kelsey's sensitive nub. Rafael added a finger and started stroking the detective's G-spot with a "come here" motion. Kelsey's moans grew louder and longer. Drawn-out cries of desperation filled the room as Kelsey became close to release. Rafael's lips were sucking, wrapping themselves around her clit. His lips were soft and wet, and Rafael did not shy away from using them to his advantage. His greedy lips tried to suck on Kelsey as much and lovingly as possible. His tongue was a whole other story; his tongue was warm and thick. It teased her entrance with quick flicks that turned into extended explorations of everything he could reach.

As Kelsey felt herself coming closer, His movements became more frantic; he knew what he was doing. He needed to make her cum. Kelsey's entire body shuddered and convulsed as she came against Rafael's face, his mouth and hands not daring to stop until it was all out of her. Every extra touch and kiss sent tremors throughout her body until he finally pulled away. Rafael laid soft kisses over her body as he made his way back up to her lips. When his lips met Kelsey's, she wrapped her arms around his neck "that was terrific darling, thank you."

Rafael pulled off the girl and removed his clothing, and pulled on lounge pants from his overnight bag that was by the door. The man turned the lamp off and climbed into bed with the blondie. "You're so fucking beautiful when you cum, baby, and the way you moan and whimper. fuck baby. It's soo good. The older man started kissing Kelsey again. Kelsey was feeling bold, and she let her hand wander into his lounge pants, feeling the big thick erection against the palm of her hand. "you don't have to, baby. I will sleep it off." Kelsey shook her head " I want to, Darling, let me return the favour."

Kelsey started lazily pumping Rafeal's erection. the throaty moan that escaped the man's lips was pure ecstasy to the woman. "Please, baby, don't tease me," Kelsey knelt between the man legs. She leaned forward and took the head of his dick into her mouth, and started to suck him. "FUCK BABY" the man was a panting mess kelsey started to bob up and down on his dick she flicked her tongue over the head. Rafael threaded his hands through her hair and began to fuck her mouth. Her salvia all over his dick and balls while she took the throat fuck so well." Your so perfect angel, tan Buena puta polla." she reached down and started massaging his balls, "I going to cum", he stilled, giving her a choice between either wanking him off or letting him cum down her throat. To his surprise, Kelsey chose the latter, swallowing every drop of cum he produced.

Kelsey cuddled into the man's side as he came down from his high." you.are.so.perfect.baby.all.fucking.mine" Rafael kissed the girl between each word ", all yours, Rafi, I promise." the man pulled her so close to him she was practically on top of him. The room fell into a comfortable silence as kelsey was dozing in and out of sleep. At this moment, she knew that she could trust this man entirely with her life. She never felt as happy or safe as when she did with Rafael. This was her final thought as sleep took over her body.

#raul esparza #rafael barba #rafael barba fanfiction #rafael barba fic #rafael barba smut #rafael barba imagine #rafeal barba fluff #rafael+barba+smut #law and order special victims unit

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justanotherlifeff · 4 years ago

Text

Levi Ackerman × reader

Genre: Angst, Hurt/comfort, Fluff, matured themes, slowburn

Warning: There's mentions and descriptions of underage rape and suicidal themes and self harm and other triggering stuff. THERE IS SMUT IN THIS CHAPTER

6 months later

"Oi Hanji! Give her something for the pain and do something fucking useful for once!" Levi growled as (Y/N) almost sprained his hand with a squeeze as she held his hand during another contraction. Levi deeply regretted teaching her those exercises to improve her strength all those months back. "Calm down Levi. I'm not the doctor here and I am not using some experimental pain killer that I made without any human testing on my best friend." Hanji replied to him calmly. Levi was loosing his grip as he wasn't ready for it.

When (Y/N) told him that her water broke at dawn, he panicked more than he ever did in his entire life. More than when Kenny taught him how to use knives by almost killing him. "Sir, we can't allow you to stay here... She will have her delivery soon..." a nurse meekly told the fuming captain, only to receive a deadly glare from him. If looks could kill, the nurse would've been dead by now. "Levi, listen to them. They delivered more babies than most of the survey corps’ titan kills." Hanji tried to reason with him. However, that seemed to stop working for the last 8 hours, after (Y/N)'s contractions began. "Levi, as the commander of the survey corps, I command you to get the fuck out of this room." Hanji told him in a commanding tone as she lost all patience with him. He was testing her like a spoilt child for the last 8 hours about almost everything.

Levi fell asleep on the chair in the waiting room. Hanji was sitting beside him, quiet sleepy herself. At least she took an afternoon nap yesterday and she felt immensely guilty for giving a huge pile of paperwork to Levi the same day. He had been working all day and wasn't able to sleep at night too as (Y/N)'s contractions started at dawn. Buying their home at Trost was a great decision as the hospital was nearby as (Y/N) had a hard time riding a horse to get there. Both Levi squad and (Y/N) squad was there except Marie, who apparently had a headache.

Hanji personally never liked Marie either and she agreed with Levi about the fact that this girl was trying to double cross (Y/N). However, Hanji saw why (Y/N) refused to let her go. If she only cooperated, she could've been a good asset to the team. It had been 2 more hours since Hanji got Levi to get out of the delivery room, 10 hours since (Y/N)'s water broke. After these agonising two hours, a nurse entered the waiting room with a pained look but a smile while rubbing her hands. It didn't take long for Hanji to figure out that she offered (Y/N) to hold her hand, given that her hand looked red. Watching the nurse, Hanji was barely able to tap Levi's shoulder twice as he jerked awake and asked the nurse in panic.

"Is (Y/N) okay?". Hanji realised that Levi took the pained look on the nurse's face as a signal to something is wrong other than the fact that (Y/N) squeezed the soul out the poor woman's hand. "Yes they both are fine. They are cleaning the baby as we speak. Congratulations Mr Ackerman. It's a boy. Would you like to see them?" The nurse asked with a smile. Hanji noticed that Levi looked paler than usual. His hands were shaking a bit too. "Yes." Levi answered after getting a grip on himself.

Levi followed the nurse into the cabin where (Y/N) had been transferred. Everyone else followed too. They were made to wait till (Y/N) was transferred into the cabin but that didn't take too long. As the nurse opened the door and walked in, Levi saw a scene that he, even in his wildest dreams never imagined. There on the bed right opposite to the door laid (Y/N), a small white bundle in her arms. She looked tired, almost as if she would pass out but there was a slight smile on her face as her eyes were filled with curiosity and love as she looked at the small bundle. "She doesn't look like herself at all..." Levi internally thought.

Yes, (Y/N) didn't have the look of a ruthless killer anymore. She looked different. "She's giving off the same expression that my mother used to have..." Levi thought curiously as he stepped towards (Y/N). That's when he realised why (Y/N) had such a sudden change. That's because what he saw affected him too. Almost as greatly as it did to (Y/N). Inside the small, there was this small baby, with raven hair, eyes the exact copy of Levi, only they were (E/C) instead of the steel grey that Levi's eyes hold. "He even got that constipated look" Hanji muttered as she followed Levi towards (Y/N).

At this point, Levi sat down abruptly on the chair right in front of the bed. His legs were shaking. There was no balance in his body. Years of training, his unbreakable balance, his extreme reflexes, all gone after looking at this sight. "I have a kid..." Levi's voice croaked out suddenly. Both his squad, (Y/N)'s squad, Hanji and (Y/N) herself looked at him as if they just saw something extremely unexpected happen. It was unexpected after all. Levi, the person who never got his guard down after meeting Kenny, was weak, vulnerable and he didn't bother hiding it.

"Levi, are you okay?" Hanji asked Levi before anyone else as everyone was extremely taken aback by Levi's actions. Even (Y/N) was taken aback as she never saw Levi like this. "Levi... " (Y/N) tried to say but her voice was raspy as her throat was dry. Without saying any more, (Y/N), extended a hand towards his, held his hand gently, trying to make him feel better. "Can I hold...it?" Levi muttered, as he got some grip on himself after (Y/N) held his hand. "Oi Levi! Don't call your own son it!" Hanji exclaimed. "Hanji, let him be. I'm sure he's having a hard time processing it all. I am too." (Y/N) told Hanji, her voice still raspy. The nurse helped to take the baby from (Y/N)'s arms and gave it to Levi, teaching how to hold the baby.

The baby simply stared at Levi, as if he was hugely disappointed with the fact that he was taken from his mother. Levi just stared at the baby for a few moments. He had a family now. He found someone who gave him the reason to live on and now he has a child, someone who he could give the good childhood he never got. Hesitantly, Levi placed a light kiss on the baby's forehead, surprising the whole group of people in the room, not surprising (Y/N) too much as she saw Levi showing emotions before. (Y/N) just smiled, knowing that the man before her was at peace.

They both were at peace. Her dreams came true. She now has a family. The both of them finally found happiness. "You guys, I'll contact the Reeves company and get meat for you all. Sasha, you will be cooking and arranging everything at my house. I'll pay for everything." Levi told everyone, looking at them with a small smile on his face. "M-meat? You will buy meat for us?" Sasha stammered before shouting out, "HEICHOU! YOU ARE THE BEST SQUAD LEADER ANYONE CAN POSSIBLY GET!" while crying like a maniac. Everyone else looked happy and thanked Levi for the treat.

"Guys, get out now. I need some rest" (Y/N) stated after a while. Everyone already took turns to hold the baby and Levi proved to be an overprotective father, as he inspected everyone as they took the baby and snapped at Connie when he made a mistake trying to hold the baby. No one wanted to leave though, as the baby was just too cute to leave alone. After some groans of disappointment, they all left. All except Levi.

"What will we name him?" (Y/N) asked him. She didn't want to bring the topic up in front of the others as she didn't want their contribution in this matter. "What about Farlan?" Levi answered after thinking for a moment. "Sure. It's a nice name. Farlan Ackerman sounds good." (Y/N) answered with a smile. The baby was asleep on the cot beside the bed. Levi looked at him and sighed. "Yeah. It sounds nice" He answered, a small smile forming on his face. He then walked towards (Y/N), patted her head gently and said, "Take some rest. I'll be back soon. I'll have to take a nap myself.". That's when (Y/N) noticed how tired he looked. Levi was used to being sleep deprived. That's not what tired him. What tired him was the amount of tension he went through for the last 11 hours. He very much needed a nap.

(Y/N) was woken by the sound of the door of the cabin opening. She had a sound sleep as the nurses took care of Farlan except for the times when he had to be fed. (Y/N) noticed that it was already evening as she saw the orange light coming from the window into the room. It was Pixis who just entered the room. Of course, it didn't surprise (Y/N). After what he did on her wedding, she came to acknowledge the fact that Pixis was completely unpredictable.

"I see that I have a grandchild now." Pixis stated with a smirk. "Yes. That part was obvious." (Y/N) replied with a stoic expression. "Don't be so bland (Y/N). I'm just here to see the baby. I haven't seen many new-borns in my lifetime." Pixis answered as he walked towards the cot. "Did you ever see me when I was a baby?" (Y/N) asked in return. Pixis stopped in front of the cot and answered, "No. I didn't.". He tried to hide it but his voice showed some remorse and so, (Y/N) didn't further question him. "His eyes look a lot like Levi. What's his name?" Pixis asked (Y/N), as he looked at the sleeping baby. "Farlan" (Y/N) answered. "Ah I see." Pixis answered. Before he could say anything more, Levi entered the room.

He just came back after getting the best sleep of his life as he felt like the happiest person on earth. However, seeing Pixis there worried him. That guy abandoned (Y/N) after all. "Should I give you some privacy?" he asked (Y/N) as he figured that (Y/N) would like to talk to Pixis alone. After all, their relationship was worse than just shaky and Levi thought that him being there would just make things more awkward. "No it's fine. You can stay" (Y/N) answered. After Levi entered the room, Pixis told him, "Congratulations on being a father" with a smile.

"Thank you." Levi answered curtly. The baby was awake by now as Pixis picked him up. "So, we all will pretend as if we are one big happy family?" Levi asked Pixis, raising an eyebrow. After all, the last thing Levi expected was that he would see Pixis holding his son. "Whatever helps him sleep at night" (Y/N) scoffed. To that Pixis let out a brief laugh before saying, "No wonder you're my daughter. However, you've got the sharp tongue of your mother...". At that, (Y/N) stopped him and said, "Don't compare me to that foul woman." with a frown.

"Okay. I won't. Anyway, I will have to take my leave now. And Levi, everyone likes to play family at some point. I won't deny that I'm the reason for which (Y/N) had a horrible life but we can't change that now can we?" Pixis answered before keeping Farlan in the cot and leaving the room. "Are you okay (Y/N)?" Levi asked (Y/N) as he didn't know how (Y/N) felt about the whole thing. "Yeah I'm fine. I personally don't accept him as my father but I'm glad that Farlan will probably have a grandfather. At this point, the only thing I care about is Farlan's happiness as I already found mine" (Y/N) told him with a smile.

1 month and a week later

(Y/N) made certain errors in her prediction from 6 months ago. She had her delivery a week before it was predicted. Farlan however, was healthier than ever. She also took more than a month to recover. A month and half to be exact. Thus, the expedition had to be delayed for a week. Levi didn't even have to push Hanji about it because Hanji figured out how long (Y/N) would actually take to recover a few weeks after she gave birth. She made all the arrangements for the delay of the expeditions by then much to (Y/N)'s disappointment. She however couldn't complain later when she really took a week more to recover. That gave them two weeks to eradicate all titans left in Wall Maria.

Hundreds of titans were killed using the executioner from hell before winter. The plan was that there would be two expeditions. Each with 3 days worth of supply. The survey corps would be divided into two groups. One would be travelling from Trost, eastwards, facing every titan on the way and travelling in groups, 2 squads in each, to attract the titans till they reach Utopia. The other would be travelling from Utopia, westwards till they reach Trost. The only two strategists capable of leading a team if something went terribly wrong were Hanji and (Y/N), with Hanji clearly being better than (Y/N) due to her longer experience in battle. Thus, it was decided that (Y/N), along with Levi's experience, would lead the group from Trost while Hanji would lead the group from Utopia.

The Survey corps had 201 members by now, Levi squad having an extra. The usual squad had 5 members including the squad leader. 20 squads would be there on each group. The formation would be such that every group of two squads would be 10 km apart from eachother. If something went wrong with the formation, red smoke signals would be used. (Y/N) squad and Levi squad, partnered with two other squads, would be positioned in the middle of the formation so that they could immediately run to help if any other squad is harmed. It would, however, take about an hour to get the formation done as the distance between wall Maria and Wall Rose is 100 km and survey corps horses could run at a speed of 80km/hr. Levi squad will give Armin to Hanji squad so that the other team could use the strength they are lacking due to the absence of either one of Levi, (Y/N) or a titan shifter, given that, Armin was the most powerful titan shifter on the team.

Thus, the team from Trost would have a hundred members while the team from Utopia would have a hundred and one. The survival rate this time, would only be a 50% however as everyone is expected to charge straight at the titans instead of running.

"You all will be using your 3DMG to go and get all the dummies cut. However, from today till the expedition, you'll all be competing against (Y/N) here. If any of you can get around the forest before her, congratulations, you stand a chance against her if she just got out of a delivery. If any of you gets tangled in your own wire again, I swear I'll kick you out of the survey corps." Levi lectured all the cadets. (Y/N) joined them as planned today, so that she can brush up her training. The last night, Levi personally took (Y/N) to check if she can use 3DMG, and (Y/N) surprised him.

She was almost as good as before her pregnancy leave. Sure, she was still rough around some edges, her movements weren't as flawless as it was before, her speed decreased noticeably too but she still was better than all recruits combined. All the cadets were greatly interested in watching (Y/N) in action. (Y/N) was the only person in the entire Survey corps who's 3DMG skills were comparable to Levi's. Everyone knew that and as the new recruits never saw (Y/N) in action, competing her seemed like a very good sport to them. Defeating (Y/N) meant coming second to the strongest in humanity. Levi squad and (Y/N) squad however knew that it wasn't possible. "Everyone, assume positions!" Levi commanded and everyone ran to the line drawn in front of the forest. They all stood in line, ready to take off. "And go!" Levi instructed and everyone took off.

The new recruits were surprised to see (Y/N) getting way ahead of everyone at a speed that was impossible for them to reach. "What the hell? She isn't even using too much gas..." one of the recruits exclaimed. (Y/N) was out of their sight in no time and as they found the dummies, every one of them had a perfect slice cut off it's nape. There were 16 dummies in total. It took the others 30 minutes to find and cut down every single one of them and getting out while (Y/N) did the same in 13 minutes. Levi squad and (Y/N) squad took 25 minutes while Mikasa took 18. "Good work out there." Levi told (Y/N) as she flew out of the forest. "Well, I usually am faster than that." (Y/N) answered, as she got her blades in the sheathes in the 3DMG. "Yes. I know that. If you didn't just have a delivery last month, I'd have been disappointed." Levi answered to that. (Y/N) just gave a "mhhm" for reply before she spoke again.

"I'm not so sure if leaving Farlan with Hanji was a good idea..." (Y/N) muttered. "Well, he'll be fine." Levi answered casually. "Are you sure about that? Hanji did try to make him walk at the age of three weeks for her experiments... " (Y/N) muttered remembering the time when Hanji tried to test if Levi's genetics had something that made them become physically developed more easily than others given that all the other known ackermans, Kenny and Mikasa, had good fighting abilities. Of course, Hanji's experiments didn't work and Farlan got hurt and cried, which sounded more angry than pained, thus scaring Hanji to death as Levi gave Hanji a death glare once it happened. After all, Levi did try to kill a commander before.

5 days later

"Hanji, the milk is in the cupboard in the kitchen with the bottle. Boil the bottle before feeding Farlan. The nappies, shirts and blankets are in the third drawer in the wardrobe of mine and Levi's room. If Farlan wets himself, just take anything from there. I kept everything packed in a bag which is also in the wardrobe so that you can bring it when you come to the headquarters. And Hanji, don't try to do any experiments. I'm trusting you on this." (Y/N) explained Hanji. "You explained all of that to me every single day of this week you know." Hanji mentioned in a flat tone. "Well, I was just reminding you..." (Y/N) started before Hanji stopped her and said in a light tone, "Come on (Y/N)! I literally lead the survey corps! Farlan will be fine. Don't worry so much.". "Yeah... I guess I'm a bit too paranoid... Thanks for all the help Hanji." (Y/N) answered with a smile. "Yeah yeah I know. You'll be late for training if you keep trying to remind me stuff now. So, get out." Hanji pushed (Y/N) out of the house.

(Y/N) POV

When I reached the survey corps headquarter and walked in the training grounds, Levi was already there. "You're late. You're doing 50 laps after training." he told me with a frown. Yes, I obviously never got special treatment from him in case of work related matters. I appreciated it though as our personal lives shouldn't interfere with work. The female cadets looked happy with the fact that I got laps. Well, it doesn't matter. It isn't like they have the guts to make a move on Levi. "Well, assume positions now. I'll be following you all." Levi commanded everyone. I joined everyone in front of the starting line. "And go!" Levi instructed as we all shot forward.

"Make as less moves as possible. Preserve gas. Find the locations of the dummies and cut them." my mind kept repeating as I sped towards the forest. The slightest movements caught my attention as some recruits were left to move the dummies. One, two, three... My mind counted as I kept making perfect cuts on every dummy. Just as I landed outside the forest, I found no one. Of course, Levi mentioned that he will be following us in the next training exercise. He probably is with the other recruits.

After about 20 more minutes, everyone else appeared with Levi. Levi looked at me, his eyes showing appreciation. "You reached your previous records. Your moves are as good as before now. Good job." he complimented before turning to the new recruits and saying, "You all couldn't improve any more than 30 minutes in six fucking months and she did the same fucking job in 11 minutes by a week after having a delivery about a month and half ago. This is why I don't train brats like you all. I don't know how Shadis keeps his cool with you all.". He said all of that calmly with a stoic expression but the girls in the group almost started crying already. Levi then turned to my squad and his own squad and said, "You all did okay. There's still room for improvement though.". They all saluted and Levi motioned them to be at ease before looking at me and saying, "Well, what are you waiting for? Go get the laps done."

2 hours and 30 minutes later

I finally was done with the laps. Hanji came by with Farlan and saw me doing laps in the training grounds. 400 meters each lap. About 20 km. "And here I thought shorty was getting soft..." Hanji shook her head as she ran beside me carrying Farlan when she found me. "Well, he honestly got softer than before. I remember him shouting at me back when I took a minute to get a dummy down. Now he's saying his squad that they did a good job after they took 25 minutes to get 16 dummies." I answered. No wonder they weren't improving.

I went to my office to get the extra uniform I usually keep there incase if the one I'm wearing gets dirty. With that, I went to the female bathrooms and took a bath, changed my uniform, went to my office to grab the stack of paperwork Hanji told me that she would leave in my office and went for Levi's office. I knocked on his door and heard his voice saying, "State your name and business.". "It's (Y/N)." I answered. "Come in" I heard his voice, now sounding softer and went in his office. His table had three stacks of paperwork, his face showing the stress that he was on. I sat down with my own stack and started working silently, helping Levi with his paperwork sometimes while he helped me with mine. When I was done, he still had two stacks to complete. I looked at him, he looked tired. Thus, I got up, walked towards his chair and went under the table.

Back when I was about 6 months pregnant, I had this phase when I was horny all the time and that's when I found out that getting a blowjob while he's working calms Levi down when he has to do a lot of paperwork. Thus, this little tradition started where I helped him out every time I saw him struggling with work. I heard a sigh of content from him as I took his dick in my mouth, swirling my tongue around it's tip. I felt his hand on my hair, gently pushing me on his length. I didn't give him the chance to guide me as I started going all out on him, taking all of his length in my mouth and bobbing my head on it, my tongue working at it's tip the entire time. The gentle touch on my hair turned into a harsh grab as Levi took control, making my movements even faster.

I heard Levi's breathing getting disoriented and suddenly, there was a knock on the door. I stopped my assault on his dick so that he could answer the door without having any distractions. "State name and business" I heard him say with a flat monotone voice. He had this way of keeping his body entirely under control, which fascinated me to bits. "It's Cadet Schwarz. I need to talk to you, heichou." I heard Marie's voice. What is that girl upto? "Come in" Levi answered as I heard the door open and her footsteps coming into the room.

"Schwarz, the last time you were in my office, as much as I can recall, (Y/N) gave you a warning about your attire. Why are you violating the dress code again?" I heard Levi ask her. That's it. I know very well what she's trying to do. I'd have to write a report against her and probably give her a talk about backing off from my husband. "Heichou, I will get straight into point. I only joined the survey corps for you. When I heard that they were taking members in the Special operations squad, I thought it was your squad. However, I wasn't lucky enough and ended up in hers. Heichou, I can keep you much happier than she ever can. Just..." Levi stopped her before she said anything more.

"Listen, what you're doing is highly inappropriate. I'm a married man and I'm in a happy marriage. I even have a kid. Even if I wasn't married, I would never leave (Y/N) for anyone. So, I'll tell this to you for the last time, stop embarrassing yourself." Levi answered, in a stoic voice. "Is that right heichou? Then why does your face look so flustered? You know what heichou? You can be with your wife. She doesn't have to know what happens behind closed doors..." Marie continued. I quietly stuffed Levi's penis in his pants and started buttoning him up when I heard Levi's surprised and slightly disgusted voice saying, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?". To that, Marie replied, "I'm just trying to show you exactly what got you so flustered. Isn't that what you...".

"Enough" I spoke up, stopping Marie. I got up from under the table and Marie clearly understood why Levi was flustered after seeing my messy hair. "Marie, go to my office. We need to discuss your expulsion from the survey corps." I told her with a cold tone. "Expulsion? But I haven't broken any rules. By the way, isn't the commander the only person who can expel someone from the survey corps? You can't do that!" Marie scoffed. It was time to put her in her place. "Well, if you don't trust me on this, you can ask Levi if I was nominated to be the commander of the survey corps only a few months ago." I told her, my tone getting colder by the second.

Marie looked at Levi and Levi simply answered, "She's right. See, I told you to stop this bullshit. Even if (Y/N) didn't take actions, I would have.". "Actions? But I haven't broken any rule!.." I stopped her at that and told her, "Marie, five buttons of your shirt are opened. You just ignored a direct warning from a superior. If you think I didn’t write a report on you violating the dress code before, you are wrong. Of course, that alone can't get you kicked out of the survey corps but I also have further complains against you, which we will discuss in my office. So, go.". "No! I refuse to go!" Marie made a bitch face at me.

"You refuse to go? Well, you see, unfortunately as long as you are a survey corps soldier, I will be your superior. You will have to follow my orders or else the consequences would be severe." I told her in a commanding voice as she retreated from the office. "Thanks for having my back, Levi." I told him as he looked at me with worry. "No, it's fine. Just don't kill her." he told me, his eyes showing suspicion. "Don't worry. I won't kill her. I'll just ruin her career." I answered before getting out of Levi's office and going to mine.

Marie was already in the office. "Well, let's discuss your insubordination." I told her before sitting on my chair. "Sit down. You'd prefer not to fall on the floor after I tell you the few things I'm about to say." I told her, motioning to the chair in front of me. She sat and I started. "Do you know what happened to the last person who tried to take Levi from me?" I asked her. She looked uncomfortable at this point as she knew that I had her cornered. "No?" she answered.

"Her name was Petra Ral. She died on the 57th expedition. The female titan stomped on her. Surprisingly, the female titan was able to do that in my presence. The next expedition is coming soon and who knows, maybe you would be eaten by a titan too and I wouldn't be able to save you." I stopped. I saw her face losing colours. Just the reaction I wanted to see.

"You see, as your superior, I had to report every time you almost got the squad killed to the commander. The commander herself questioned your worth and I have been defending you for the whole time. However, it seems like you aren't fit to be in the survey corps anyway, even if I don't consider the fact that you tried to fuck my husband. Honestly, I shouldn't be telling you all these. I should just let you die on the next expedition. You just proved to me how worthless you are today.

However, ever since Farlan was born, I couldn't shake this feeling off me. I don't want to make your family suffer. I know how your mother would feel if you die. So, I would give you a second option. If I talk to the commander and expel you from the survey corps, that would be the end of your career in the military. If I don't do anything, you will die. If you give me a letter asking for a transfer to the Garrison or the Military police, your career would be saved, you would live and I could keep you out of my relationship. Now, go back to your room and decide what you want. I will be expecting a letter from you. You're dismissed." I explained to her in my monotone voice. With that, she left the room without a word. I rested my head on the head rest of the chair. "Fuck.. Farlan really changed everything..." I wondered. After all, I didn't feel like the cold hearted person I was anymore.

To be continued...

Taglist: @reality-is-often-disappointing, @kingtamakimurder

#levi smut #levi aot #levi x reader #levi attack on titan #shingeki no kyoujin levi #levi x fem!reader #levi×reader #captain levi #levi ackerman

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a-crimson-lion · 4 years ago

Text

A (Hopefully) Reasonable Response

For @kiricookie .

[Read this if you want the following ramblings to make any sense.]

(Sorry this is so hecking long and all over the place, I just wanted to be thorough.)

[Manga Spoilers and Movie Spoilers Ahead]

I’m gonna do things a little differently here.

For starters, I’m gonna not gonna be addressing the fandom at large, because the fandom at large won’t be able to give me an answer.

I’m just talking to you, kiricookie. Because it’s your post, and you deserve to know what people (like myself) think of it. Just letting you know right now, and this is with absolutely NO sarcasm: I won’t be rude. I’ll do my damndest to not be rude.

Because you didn’t go and make that post and share it with the entirety of the world wide web just for it to get ridiculously crapped on without so much as a glance.

So, I’ll read it. I’ll think about it. And I’ll give you my thoughts. You don’t have to read them if you don’t want to. But common courtesy makes it so I leave the opportunity. You deserve that much.

You probably already know what this is about anyway. So I’ll start with something… unexpected, at least coming from someone like me…

...you’re right.

To be more specific, you’re right about Tenya. You’re right about how his split second decision to murder Stain should be concerning and in fact is concerning. You’re right about how he’s the most prone to lose his control and how his emotions get the better of him. You’re right about all that.

*Internal wince* Now, if you don’t mind me going into other details…

I’m not saying anything that spurnned on Tenya to murder the Hero Killer was in any way justified; it wasn’t. It never could be, it never should be. Murder is wrong no matter how the hell you look at it, and even if you have no choice but to go through with it, you shouldn’t be happy that you had to take someone’s life under any circumstances. But looking through Tenya’s perspective for a moment… he lost a brother, in a way. He lost a hero. Someone extremely close to him, who inspired him and others, who did nothing but good in any way he possibly could. And then he got cut down by someone who Tenya only knows as the antithesis of good and now his brother can’t do any good, or at least not as much as he used to.

Again, that doesn’t excuse attempted murder. In a morbid way, it’s sort of the logical extreme of when we saw Tenya at the start of the series: he immediately writes of Izuku because he only sees him as a hindrance and recognizes his own shortcomings after the fact. He immediately guns after Stain because he did something unforgivable in his eyes, and recognizes his own shortcomings after the fact.

In the heat of the moment, Tenya is prone to failure. He is prone to misjudgement. We’re talking about the same guy who decked his best friend because he was about to do something borderline illegal. The entire point of Tenya is to showcase the distance between what he wants to be and what he actually is, and the steps he takes to get there.

But yeah, the murder plot was a tad… oh who am I kidding, a HELL of a lot of overkill.

But circling back to why we keep scrutinizing Katsuki about his mannerisms while we keep praising Tenya from sunrise to sunset… I can’t speak for all of us Bakugo antis, because I know some of us have legitimate reasons for disliking him and the others are butthurt record players on repeat that you mentioned, but I can at least give out my reasoning behind it.

We don’t talk often about Tenya having a murder episode because he never tries to do it again, and he legit tries to improve and avoid anything similar happening again.

After the Hosu incident, Tenya admits that Stain was right about him, and he resolves to not be a screw up from then on out. He makes an effort to be a better class representative, a better example than what he had been setting before. He doesn’t deck Izuku just because “hE aNgY” during the Hideout Raid arc; he doesn’t want Izuku to make the same mistakes as he did, because everyone else was worried about Tensei, Stain, and Tenya, but Tenya was so dead set on “righting a wrong” that he ignored everyone around him and nearly got himself killed for it, and if things were any worse in Hosu, Tenya might not have been the only one dead. For all intents and purposes, that’s what Tenya thinks is happening again when the Bakugo Rescue Squad suggests tracking their friend down.

And like you mentioned when Tenya offered to lend an ear to Izuku when the Shie Hassaikai incident was tearing him apart from the inside, that’s the progression coming full circle. Tenya realizes that there are other people in the equation that he needs to listen to and that need to be listened to, otherwise they’ll do something completely ludicrous and get themselves and/or other people hurt in the process.

And the thing is, Tenya only needs to have his “Oh f***” moment once. And it’s barely brought up again, which puts out of the audience’s minds.

(Sidenote, while you’re “heroes not killing is weak” thing kinda came out of left field with me, I actually agree. A whole lot actually. Just so you know.)

The thing about Katsuki is that everything supposedly “wrong” with him… is still kinda going on to some extent. Sure, the people at UA have thicker skin and are willing to brush him off or call him out, but that doesn’t change the fact that some of his behavior is… highly concerning.

Personally I tend to avoid the Episode 1 suicide baiting (“avoid,” not “ignore”) because it was forever ago and it is repetitive, but I still think it needs to be addressed to some degree. In any case, Katsuki’s actions throughout the series are what get me and others to not think he’s exactly hero material. In any team exercises, he often puts himself at the forefront (not without reason, but still) and tends to shy away from tag-teaming unless his back’s against the wall. Despite what the Joint Training Arc would claim, Baku did most of the heavy lifting on his own, with little to no actual teamwork, though that’s more of a narrative problem than an in-universe problem. Even his teamwork with Izuku is still shaky at best; he keeps yelling at him, berating him, and telling him to do his best just so he won’t screw Katsuki over.

Say what you will about Katsuki’s “unique” personality, it may fly with his classmates, but realistically speaking, it’s gonna be a problem for when he does get into Professional Hero work. Can he be rude and snarky on professional business? Absolutely. Does he have to scream at his partner(s) whilst making them feel like they’re at the bottom of the barrel? Eh…

Before I commit to your last paragraph, I wanna bring up something. We can both agree that Tenya lost a hero when Tensei was attacked, right? We can both agree that his decision to ignore everyone and go in guns blazing was terrible, 0/10, wouldn’t recommend, right?

Okay. It’s not to the same degree, but… Katsuki has done something similar.

Katsuki lost a hero too. His name was All Might?

And what did Katsuki do well after the fight was over. He didn’t talk about it with anyone. He dragged out his childhood friend so he could rough him up, because fists is the only way he knows how to deal with his disconnect of societal expectations and, as AO3 would attest, Katsuki is complete s*** at feelings.

Katsuki did the same things Tenya did, albeit to a lesser degree. They both lost a hero. They both didn’t talk about it to anyone. And in the end, they both tried to hurt someone in order to alleviate their pain. The aftermath is… admittedly lucky for both parties.

So, about your last paragraph before the GIF… do you wanna know why antis (at least like me) keep bringing up Katsuki’s previous mistakes. It’s less so because they ever happened, or even because Katsuki did them. It’s more so because despite what the narrative and most of the fandom may think, Katsuki’s mistakes are never treated as such, at least not substantially. Eraserhead doesn’t even bother giving Katsuki a pep-talk about his behavior on the first day, or at any time he’s there to witness Katsuki acting like a jackass. All Might doesn’t stop the training exercise when Katsuki nearly kills a fellow student, which he was aware of being a possibility but it’s fine so long as he dodges, and it isn’t even addressed properly afterwards. In the Final Exams, Katsuki hitting his partner and later being dragged out the gate doesn’t bar him from passing, like say, Hanta; while Katsuki did contribute more, it doesn’t change the fact that his initial uncooperative behavior wouldn’t fly in the Pro Hero world, and he made himself a liability in those last few seconds against All Might. Even him losing the Provisional License Exam isn’t as big of a deal, because Katsuki gets to learn about a really important Quirk, no one’s grilling him like, say, Izuku is getting grilled, and not having his License and getting an additional day of house arrest spares him a potential “maybe strength isn’t everything” ass whooping from Mirio. I could go on a bit longer, but I think you get the jist.

Now, I’d absolutely LOVE it if society didn’t royally f*** up Katsuki’s perspective the way it did, but the problem is that the narrative has absolutely no intention of showing or admitting that Katsuki’s perspective is problematic. Ever since Deku vs Kacchan 2 decided that was enough development for Katsuki, he is always in the right, 100% of the time. Any opposition is few and far between, and will often be seen in the wrong anyway despite the legitimate concerns a person like Katsuki would present. Sure he can tell a kid not to look down on people during the Remedial Course arc, but when the Cultural Festival comes around he immediately decides to look down on the other classes. The fact that a majority of UA hates Class 1A is some grade-A bulls***, but the speech Katsuki gives to 1-A is also bulls***.

It essentially boils down to “F*** everybody else and only do things for yourself.” Because that’s what heroes are supposed to do…

That aside, Katsuki needs help. He needs therapy, anger management, and someone who won’t take his s*** just because he’s a so-called natural born leader with a flashy Quirk, because that’s what canon essentially boils down to. Any time Katsuki takes the lead, at least in my eyes, it’s less so because he’s a legitimately good leader and more so because the narrative has decided he’s the only one who should be taking charge.

I want Katsuki to improve, even if I personally have given up on the prospect of that happening. The problem starts when the narrative continually insists that Katsuki is more or less in the clear and is totally fine when really, he isn’t.

Izuku needing help is obvious and valid, but Katsuki needing (and getting) help is valid, too. Now if only the narrative could pick up on that.

And as for that last bit of your post… really, I can only speak for myself. As strong as Izuku is, as much as his opinion matters in this entire debacle, I can’t help but feel like Izuku is more blinded by nostalgia more than anything else. He still wants a connection with someone he’s known since childhood, and I can respect that, but the thing is, Katsuki spent nearly a decade telling Izuku, intentionally or otherwise, that he didn’t want the same thing. This continued from the time Izuku tried to help Katsuki out of a river all the way until after the Sludge Villain incident. And society had a hand in that bulls***tery, Katsuki was never the only culprit, but he was still a prominent one. And I don’t know about you, but nearly two years is probably not as long as you’d like to think it is, because that’s how long that it’s been since the overplayed, overrepeated suicide bait. And even ignoring that, two years isn’t enough of a gap between the near decade of societal degradation Izuku had to suffer through.

I don’t hate that Izuku is so forgiving. I hate that Katsuki isn’t willing to accept or consider it in any meaningful capacity. I hate that in a world where Tenya Iida, Shoto Todoroki, Kota Izumi, and even Gentle Criminal exist, that Katsuki has to be the contrarian because of his damn pride. And again, society f***ed up on that end, but that doesn’t stop the fact that Katsuki has actively refused to pursue other options, instead staying on the first and foremost thought of “blast it,” with his Quirk or his voice, unless he’s in combat, in which case it becomes “blast it but don’t be stupid about it.” Because Izuku’s forgiveness has worked before for the benefit of others. What does Katsuki get from Izuku’s forgiveness he doesn’t even fully accept, other than another obstacle he sees that needs to be beaten?

Yeah he’s still 16, yeah he’s a teenager and therefore still has the time to grow proper, but you know who else is 16? Tenya Iida. Shoto Todoroki. Two prickly, borderline asshole characters who also received gradual growth, faced setbacks and proceeded to grow past them. Meanwhile, Katsuki is still just passing the halfway point. I’m not putting that on Katsuki, but if Hori really wanted us to root for him, he shouldn’t have displayed that characters like Tenya and Shoto are able to develop overtime at faster rates than Katsuki can, and as much as I can keep playing the society card, Katsuki wasn’t the only one bombarded with high expectations. Shoto, Tenya, Momo, and potentially Mina all come from backgrounds wherein high expectations were expected of them; Shoto grew up in a confirmed abusive household for crying out loud, and we’ve seen him trying to grow past his issues.

Katsuki has yet to demonstrate anything similar. After Deku vs Kacchan 2, he’s still yelling Izuku’s ears off, or throwing his mask like a ninja star because comedy, or trying to fight a big time villain again because he still actually hasn’t learned to take a loss. Maybe it’s because he internalized most of his self-hatred and projected it onto Izuku so long, but I really can’t say for certain. The change doesn’t have to be night and day, but it can certainly be more substantial than what we’re getting now, and that alone disappoints me. And I’m sorry to say it, but the wait for Katsuki to finally grow beyond his excessive asshole tendencies and graduate to decent asshole is draining on me, and no longer a big contributor to me keeping up with the story (Izuku is a big contributor to that, because I’m basic).

Changing each other probably wouldn’t be advised, but their dynamic and their issues with and independent of one another should still be addressed. I have a big issue with “win to save, save to win” because of this, actually. Katsuki has to give a s*** about people, sure, but Izuku doesn’t need to focus more on winning when he already wins enough as is. It’s a false equivalence that further justifies the worst parts of Katsuki. That obsession with winning, with never falling behind in the eyes of society, only further fuels his need to put others down and push his physical capabilities to the maximum while he puts his emotional spectrum on the backburner. And the “friendship” he has with Izuku isn’t gonna change that, because again, Katsuki’s primary concern is surpassing One for All, surpassing Izuku as the Chosen One. He has yet to display any major concern for Izuku beyond the extent of his Quirk usage in the main series. The closest thing we’ve gotten was a look of shock on his face during Heroes: Rising, and this was in response to Izuku suggesting that he pass One for All.

On that note, Izuku cares about Katsuki, as a person, as a rival, and as a friend, and he has displayed this time and time again. Katsuki has only shown care for Izuku as an obstacle, as a challenge he must overcome and one he wants to overcome without hindrance. He has yet to show any semblance of care for Izuku beyond that with meaningful context, believe it or not. And quite frankly, I’m getting sick of people wanting to bring Katsuki on board just because Izuku is giving him the benefit of the doubt when he arguably hasn’t done anything proper to earn any of Izuku’s trust. I know Izuku’s not weak, I know he’s sound of mind, but Katsuki is not a rational subject for Izuku. He has known this boy since childhood, he has seen what he is capable of, and his optimism keeps him in a favorable light. That is incredibly noble of Izuku, and I commend him for it, but I cannot stand by the decision when Katsuki’s attitude towards Izuku and his actual contributions to Izuku’s journey don’t show anything direct or substantially reflective on Katsuki’s end.

...but that’s just me. The hell do I know anyway?

And if you actually bothered to read this word vomit… thanks.

-Crimson Lion (18 August 2020)

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