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mostly-marvel-musings · 4 years ago

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Snark Attack

A/N: It was about time I wrote for my first love in the MCU. Definitely plan on writing more. Not my gif! Feedback’s most welcome as always.

Pairing: Tony Stark x Reader

Word count: 1430

Warnings: Foul language. Blood. Loads of snark, hence the cheesy title. Fluff?

...

Spots of blood on a dirt-covered floor were the first things you saw as you slowly came to consciousness. Your vision was blurry but you could make out your surroundings, an old warehouse.

Typical.

A sharp stinging pain on one side of your head could be felt where your kidnapper hit you with a rod that had knocked you out. The ropes cut into the skin of your wrists and ankles. You were tied to a chair.

Again typical.

The predictability of the whole situation made you roll your eyes. Now all that was left, was a scruffy looking guy walking in to threaten you, and get you talking. About five minutes later that happened too.

Damn, these guys sure were amateurs!

Your cocky self obviously underestimated the severity of the situation. But you were sure rescue was on its way. Any minute now.

A tall man with too many tattoos stepped in front, grabbed your face roughly, and looked at your wound, “ I got you good didn’t I, sweetheart?”

“If I say I’m used to it would you judge me?”

“You better start talking or I’m gonna make this worse.” he said, tightening his grip on your jaw.

“Define worse.”

Just then another man dressed in a crisp looking suit stepped in the warehouse and made his way over to you. He knelt in front of you and spoke in a calm voice, “You give me what I want and no one gets hurt. You understand?”

You simply stared at him with a poker face and eyebrows raised as if daring him to make a move.

“Guess not.”

He said standing up and motioned the previous guy. He grabbed something from the table and walked over to you.

You struggled against the restraints as you noticed it was an injection.

Your best guess was sodium pentothal aka truth serum.

There was very little you could do as the needle pierced into your skin, making you wince in pain.

The dose he gave you was strong as within seconds your vision turned black and you passed out.

…

When you regained consciousness this time, you were on your feet. They were tied with metal chains, so were your hands above your head. There was plastic laid out beneath your feet. You couldn’t identify any faces, everything was a blur of hazy colors and light. It was a struggle to keep your eyes open.

The injection was making you loopy.

“What is your name?”

You didn’t answer.

A smack hit the side of your face. The tangy metal taste of your blood filled your mouth.

“Answer me.”

“(Y/N) (Y/L/N)” you answered, speech slurring. You had to keep up the act.

“You work for Shield?”

“Y-yes.” you cracked a little smile before adding, “you really think this is my first rodeo?”

A blinding pain shot through the side of your thigh, as the man stabbed you with a knife.

You screamed in agony and screwed your eyes shut.

Your pants drenched in blood as you felt it trickle down your leg and onto the plastic.

“You wanna try that again sweetheart. I got all day.” The man threatened.

“So do I.”

He stabbed you again. This time aiming for the other leg. You were sure the knife hit your bone.

The pain was excruciating but nothing you hadn’t dealt with before.

Just then the warehouse door burst open and you saw a flash of red and gold. A fight ensued but you were hardly aware of it.

Your eyes closed at this point, you felt too weak, too sleepy. After a few moments, the chains on the wrists loosened and fell through and you stumbled right into Tony’s suit.

“Hey there daredevil. You hurt?” Tony’s voice came through the face shield as he held you firmly.

“No. I normally spurt blood from my legs. Are you done playing the hero?” you retorted, still drowsy.

Did he not see the blood-soaked sheet you were standing on?

“Okay let’s get you outta here. Hang on tight.” He said as he grabbed you by the waist and took off.

You blacked out instantly.

…

Clean sheets, fluorescent lights, IV drip. You woke up in the infirmary when the stab wounds in your legs started smarting.

A vase filled with your favorite flowers placed on the bedside table caught your attention. No one’s ever got you flowers before.

You were about to press a button that summoned the nurse because you were parched when someone knocked on the door.

“Come in.” your voice came out raspy from lack of use.

In walked Tony dressed in a band T-shirt and jeans holding a bag of take-out?

“How are you feeling?” he asked walking through the room like he owned the place and took a seat on the sofa adjacent to your bed.

“Well, my entire face hurts, these stab wounds burn like a motherfucker and I have a pounding headache. Apart from that, I’m real dandy. Why do you ask?”.

You didn’t exactly get along with Tony Stark. He had a tendency to get under your skin.

The man was arrogant, sassy and too full of himself. In that sense, you two were quite alike.

“I saved your life (Y/L/N). You’re welcome for the flowers too.” he retorted, shooting a wary glance your way before fiddling with the bag he’d placed on the table.

He sent you flowers? How would he even know they were your favorite?

“I thought rescue missions were well below your pay grade. What were you even doing there?” you questioned, guard still up.

“I was in Hill’s office when she got the call about your kidnapping. Thought I’d do her a favor. Plus I had to test some new features of Mark XLV.” he stated, matter-of-factly.

In reality, Tony had been enamored ever since you had accompanied the team on a mission to take down a Hydra base. Your combat skills impressed the billionaire, and unbeknownst to you, Tony had insisted to Maria Hill that you accompany the team on more missions.

You’d always dismissed his flirty comments as his way of getting under your skin; which he was successful in.

“You know you called me handsome when you were in that truth serum haze.” his signature smirk appeared as your eyes went wide.

“You must be deluded.” you defended yourself, and silently prayed he was making it up.

“Oh, I’m not making it up. Not when someone compliments me. Especially you.” his eyes dancing with humor, clearly enjoying the effect he had on you.

You huffed and crossed your arms over your chest as you glared at him. Damn it, he managed to get a rise out of you every single time.

“Why’re you really here Tony. It’s clearly not to make me feel better.”

This seemed to soften his smug self. He straightened up and walked over to your bed and sat beside you, careful not to touch your leg.

“I wanted to make sure you were okay. Is that so hard for you to believe?”

For the first time, you didn’t know what to say. Did he actually care about you?

You kept your eyes on the sheet covering your heavily bandaged legs. The silence in the room growing awkward by the minute.

“The team is concerned about you too. The guys ordered Chinese food and I thought since you can’t join us, I’d bring it to you in here.”

“Oh. That’s nice.” you cringed internally as you said it. That’s nice?

Tony stood up and brought the bag over to you and started leaving, probably felt his presence unwanted. You stopped him as he reached for the handle.

“Thank you for the flowers, Stark. They’re my favorite.” you said, giving him a slight smile and a nod.

He turned and gave you a genuine smile. One of those rare Tony smiles that weren’t for the cameras.

“The team’s celebrating tomorrow. I hope to see you there (Y/N). And don’t bring another guy.”

And there it is.

“Sure, I’ll swing by on crutches, so glamorous.” you retorted, rolling your eyes.

“I can carry you around and keep you in my lap if you want.” Tony said, the signature smirk coming right back.

“Goodbye Tony.” you pointedly stared at the door, failing to hide the blush on your cheeks.

“See you tomorrow sweetheart.” he closed the door behind him, leaving you alone to think about what just transpired.

You rolled your eyes yet again at ‘sweetheart’ but laughed and shook your head, as you reached for the take-out.

Chinese food, another favorite.

...

#tony stark x reader #tony stark #tony stark fanfiction #tony stark fluff #sassy stark #iron man fanfic #iron man x you #iron man fluff #mcu fanfiction #marvel fanfiction #tony x reader #tony x you #tony stark imagine #my writing #mostly marvel musings #reblogs are cool #feedback is love #tony stark oneshot #oneshot

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lunchboxpoems · 4 years ago

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I am a girl, Antigone. I have a sister. We love Each other terribly.

Robyn Schiff

You would think that the two Athenians’ bodies Were poised on wings, and poised on wings they were, Philomela flying off to the woods As a nightingale, and Procne as a swallow Rising up to the eaves.

Ovid, trans. Stanley Lombardo i.

My sister tells me she is a bird. She does not say she is a bird

but I know it to be true. She wheels and dives. Her pinions swoop.

Somewhere, moss and toothwort carpet the wood floor. Somewhere:

generations of birds are born.

ii.

The nest of eggs. The shed in the woods. The foxy

gentleman and the lupines around Jemimah.

Her feathered desire. Into this story Beatrice

poured her sympathy like tea in a china cup.

The hounds lick up the broken eggs.

iii.

My sister tells me and my memory

is clean, an empty stair though she says

I walked up them, opened the door.

That I called my father

at work. What is this? This

nothing in my brain –

this blank day – my life had stood

a loaded gun.

iv.

If you slammed a door too hard

in my family’s house a rifle would fall

from the top of the wooden buffet—

a gun always seemed to be falling.

It never went off.

My other sister’s harm, I remember— another bird in the rafters—

anger on my body like a fine dust on Mars, in my lungs;

anger where the stairs met hardwood hallway,

entryway rugs, the stairs still carpeted, not yet creaking.

My pacifying mother. My other, younger sister.

vi.

I want an otherworldly ex- planation for unkindness which

is the milk of this world.

vii.

Anger is different than rage. Rage: a hurricane that makes

the whole world wet. Anger: directed at another

person like the sharpness of a scalpel; acknowledging

a person the way a wing acknowledges a buffet of air:

by flying into it. The way wing makes power of a draft—rides it.

viii.

The confusion is one of having nothing. The confusion is

I have two sisters, whom I love. They have hands and tongues.

But we three sisters have different memories, speckled and striped.

Facets of a stone. Points on a shell.

ix.

I don’t mean to go on long, to go on with longing—

like a pilgrim with a distance still to go, and a burden on their back—

but at one time all three of us were flannelled and nightgowned,

on the couch together. The moon lit. The cedars filling the night.

Happy. Laughing. Last century.

Sometimes something has to be a wing, a joint and tendon: a

wooden spoon, a dowel rod, wax— as many feathers as you can pluck

with your own two hands from a bird that only two minutes ago ran through

the clover on its yellow, spurred feet.

xi.

For each thing given to you, make one thing up. For every name

told, recite a new name. For each received story with a man making

a woman, build your own person out of feathers and flowers.

Daedalus, Pygmalion: let them go.

xii.

Arachne asks you to come and sit. Never mind her many legs. Move over.

Gossamer silk, the spider’s throwing line, has the filament strength of alloyed

steel. Arachne will teach you nothing. You teach her how to spin a tale so long

she can climb down the end and jump.

xiii.

It will always matter that you are a woman. Or that someone

saw you as one (or not one) in the past, sees you as one (or not one) in the present,

future. That bird is slang for a woman, as well as any “man made object”

(aircraft, rocket, satellite) that resembles a bird by flying, being aloft.

That “the bird” is an obscene gesture; your finger practically raises itself.

xiv.

* * * *

My sisters tell me I am a bird

HANNAH VANDERHART

#hannah vanderhart #poem #poetry #sisters

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talkfastromance4 · 4 years ago

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Against All Odds--Calum Hood (part IV soulmate!au)

Copyright talkfastromance4 © All works is intellectual property of the author. All rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction or any part or all contents in any form is prohibited. You may not, without written expression and consent from the author, distribute works amongst other social media platforms

Word count: 7.2k

Warnings: car accident, coma, stitches, an attempt at medical jargon, I did research but am in no way a doctor so if there’s fallacies, that’s why. I tried my best.

Song inspirations: move to you-jagwartwin; falling-tyler daniel; hesitate-the jonas brothers; falling-harry styles; stars in your eyes-ronnie hilton; want you back-5sos; what happens here-ASL; where will i remember you-ASL; all i want-kodaline

donate to my ko-fi here :)

Masterlist

The Click || Measured in Moments || Fractures catch up on previous parts here!

Enjoy! Feedback is always welcome :)

• • • •

Calum hears rain. He feels it as well, but it doesn’t feel like normal raindrops. His entire body hurts, but the pain is more intense in his head and in his chest. It’s as if he’s on fire with a thousand-ton weight on his head and heart. Voices float in and out of his ears, he tries to decipher the words and their meaning, but his main concern is to control his breathing.

When the pain becomes too much in his head, he forces himself to open his eyes. They’re heavy but he pushes through and blinks a few times until he sees Ashton and Ruby’s faces near his.

“Oh, thank God,” Ashton exhales dropping his head, “you scared the shit outta me.”

Calum tries to sit up but Ruby pushes onto his shoulders.

“Take it easy, Cal,” she says, her voice small, “you’ve been in and out for the past ten minutes.” The honey color in her brown eyes are brighter than usual. “What happened?”

“Where’s Rose? Something’s wrong… she’s… where is she?” Calum demands trying to sit up again, but Ashton is the one to keep him on the floor.

“Take it easy,” Ashton repeats what Ruby said, “you’ve been murmuring her name. Why do you think something’s wrong?”

“I felt it. I can…” Calum’s eyes search down his body frantically, “I feel it everywhere. I need to get to her, I need to—”

His ringtone he has set up for Rose blares from his pocket and he’s quick to pull it out. He slides his finger over the screen to answer it but before he can say a word, a man’s voice comes through.

“Is this Calum Hood?” the unfamiliar voice asks.

“Yes, who is this?” Calum sits up and swats Ashton’s hands away so he can stand up slowly. Ruby holds onto his arms for support, which he’s thankful for. He got a head rush from standing.

“This is Officer Mathers, um… your girlfriend—”

“Fiancée.”

“…Your fiancée was in a collision just now. When we arrived on scene, she was slightly coherent and kept saying your name… Can you come to the county hospital?” Officer Mathers asks.

Like a tidal wave, Calum nearly collapses again, but Ashton has a strong grip on him and keeps him upright. Ashton can see the fear in Calum’s eyes.

“We need to go to the hospital,” Calum whispers.

***

Calum tries to placate and identify every emotion coursing through his body. His whole body is wired, he’s rubbing his hands together in anxious anticipation while his leg shakes impatiently. His eyes are focused on the cracks in the tiled floor, he’s focusing on his breathing and trying not to let the heavy pain in his chest overtake him.

Ashton and Ruby sit on either side of him, they gave up trying to console him as soon as they sat down in the waiting area. Officer Mathers, the one Calum spoke to, was waiting for them at the Emergency Room entrance, a solemn expression on his face as he explained the accident.

Rose was at a four way stop just as the storm started and when she pulled forward, another car came speeding through the stop sign hitting the front end of her car. She went into a tailspin and the force of it overturned the car. When squad cars, the fire department and the ambulance showed up the car that hit her was already gone but a witness getting their groceries from their driveway who made the call saw the whole accident happen.

It took all of ten minutes to break her free from the vehicle—which was how long Calum blacked out—and when she was placed on a stretcher that’s when she started saying his name, almost like a mantra. Officer Mathers took her phone that was still somehow clutched in her hand and found his number just as she was wheeled into the back of the ambulance.

A nurse came by after the officer left and escorted Calum, Ashton and Ruby to the waiting area. Calum badgered her for questions on where Rose was, if she was okay; but the nurse didn’t have that information.

His mind races while he sits and waits. It’s been hours since they arrived, he doesn’t even want to know what time it is. Every minute of not knowing what’s happening with Rose seems like a lifetime. His heart is beating as fast as a hummingbird’s wings, he’s filled with adrenaline. He’s not sure if he wants to pace or sit here with his racing thoughts. He’s equally tired as he is wired, and he checks the glow in his chest every few minutes.

It hasn’t gone back to that dark orange, it’s as if he lost the part of Rose that helped complete him.

“I should have been with her,” he mumbles. Ashton and Ruby turn to him, their fingers are interlocked, and, in that moment, Calum is jealous of them. They have the comfort of their perfect counterpart, Calum’s never felt more alone.

“You can’t blame yourself, Cal,” Ashton tries to reason but Calum doesn’t want to hear it.

Not being able to handle sitting much longer, he rises from his chair and begins to pace. His head is still throbbing all around, so he tries to release the tension in his back by placing both hands on his neck. His fingers knead and rub the tight muscles but to no avail, his mind is still racing, and his heart is aching.

Calum.

He spins around abruptly hearing Rose’s voice, but is met instead with a woman wearing an orange surgical cap.

“Are you Calum Hood? Rose’s fiancé?” the woman asks.

“Ye—” he clears his throat, lowers his hands from his neck. “Yes, I am. Is she all right? Can I go see her?”

“I’m Dr. Robbins,” she says, “When Rose arrived, she was unresponsive, so we did some scans and found bleeding in her brain. We took her into immediate surgery to alleviate the bleeding. She has a femoral shaft fracture due to the collision and our orthopedic surgeon placed plates and screws to secure the fracture and an external fixator that holds it all in place. When you see her, it will look a little scary to see the fixator. She also has a few broken ribs and she’s being moved into the ICU so we can observe her on the clock.”

Her words fumble and stumble inside his brain, Calum tries to make sense of it all.

“Can I see her? Please?” his main concern is seeing her for himself, with his own eyes to make sure she’s all right.

“As soon as she’s settled, I’ll send a nurse to bring you to her. She won’t be awake yet, but the anesthesia should wear off in an hour or two. I’ll see you then.”

“Thank you,” Ashton says.

Calum thinks he says them as well, his mouth opens but he doesn’t hear the words. When Dr. Robbins turns on her heels, shoes squeaking on the linoleum, that’s when Calum loses his balance. Ashton and Ruby grab hold of his arms to steady him and bring him back to his chair.

Thankfully, it isn’t long before a nurse retrieves them escorting the three friends down the long, brightly lit hallway. Calum’s throat is sandpaper dry, he’s not sure what to expect when he sees Rose, but he knows when he sees her eyes, he’ll be able to tell how she’s really doing which will equally appease him.

Right when they’re about to turn into the glass paneled wall, curtains are pulled to hide the room, he takes a deep breath. When he sees her, he nearly falls to his knees. His beautiful Rose lies still in the bed, her head wrapped in cloth and gauze while her face is covered in bruises and scratches. Her left leg is elevated with small rods and screws holding her leg in place; now he understands what Dr. Robbins meant about the fixator. It makes her leg look bionic and very unnatural compared to her natural beauty.

His feet feel like lead as he steps forward moving against the curtain. Machines are beeping, while tubes, wires, and IV’s protrude from her chest and arms. When he reaches the side of her bed, he collapses into the chair placed next to it. His brown eyes are sad as he looks her over, his beautiful Rose. Carefully, he touches her hand and when he sees her ring still on her left finger, that’s what breaks him.

“Oh, Rosie,” he sighs letting his head fall onto the back of his arm. He kisses her fingers delicately, making sure not to jostle her too much. She smells like hospital, sterile and clean but he can faintly make out her distinct rose and rainwater smell.

He doesn’t notice Ashton and Ruby shuffle in and occupy the other chairs across the room. He holds her hand tightly in comfort, almost willing that he could somehow take her pain away. He’d rather it be him in the bed than her.

He doesn’t notice a nurse come in until he feels movement on the bed, and he sits up in a flash.

“Checking her vitals and numbers,” the nurse smiles as he eyes the monitors.

Calum watches him sullenly as he checks her breathing, and notices how he makes a face as he shines a small flashlight in her eyes.

“I’ll be right back.”

“What’s wrong?” Calum asks but the nurse is gone. “What’s wrong?!” he looks to Ashton and Ruby who shake their heads in confusion as well.

Dr. Robbins comes bustling in, bringing her own small light to Rose’s eyes, flicking it over as she opened her lids.

“Rose? Rose, can you hear me? I’m Dr. Robbins and you’re at the County Hospital. Rose,” she says in a cool affirmative voice.

“What’s wrong?” Calum demands, his voice hard.

“Check her blood pressure,” Dr. Robbins instructs the nurse. “Mr. Hood, I need you to wait outside.”

“What the hell is happening?” Calum roars rising to his feet. Dr. Robbins eyes him.

“I need to run a few tests on her right now, and for me to properly help her, I need you to wait outside for me, okay? Right outside the door,” Dr. Robbins speaks to him as if he’s a child but it’s not in a condescending way.

“C’mon, mate, let’s go outside,” Ashton says suddenly next to him.

Calum holds onto Rose’s hand as long as he can, his eyes never leaving her face until the curtains are pulled around her bed. Closing Calum off from her again. He hears medical jargon through the thin piece of fabric. He waits, he listens, he watches the glow in his chest flicker.

Five minutes later, Dr. Robbins pulls them aside.

“Rose has a traumatic brain injury and I believe that is what has her in a comatose state,” Dr. Robbins tells him, Ashton, and Ruby. “The impact of the other car caused severe trauma and her body is trying to heal itself in this way.”

“Will she wake up?” Ashton asks.

“It’s hard to say at this stage, statistics show—”

“I don’t want to hear the statistics. She’s going to wake up, what can we do to help her?” Calum asks with not even an ounce of doubt.

“Keep her as comfortable as possible, it’s a good sign she’s breathing on her own but we’ll set her up with a feeding tube so she can still get the nutrients that she needs. We’ll continue to monitor, do routine coma tests and make sure that her leg is healing properly.”

“Let’s do that, then,” Calum nods and moves to go back to her room. He looks back at Dr. Robbins, Ashton, and Ruby. The look they’re giving him is full of sadness. “She’s going to wake up.”

Two Weeks Later

Calum has been at the hospital day and night with Rose. Unwilling to leave her until she wakes up, the staff have brought in a bed for him to sleep in and placed it right next to hers. The first few days were the hardest, Calum was still in shock and trying to process all that’s happened. The guys stayed with him in rotation until it was well past visiting hours. The nights were the hardest, Calum ached to lay next to her and hear her true heartbeat rather than the beeps of the monitor.

As the days went by, her hospital room became like their own little one room apartment. Ashton and Ruby were kind enough to bring their pillows and blankets, clothes for Calum to change in and out of, their poetry books and record player paired with their favorite records.

Michael and Crystal have taken in Duke and Honey until Calum and Rose can return home. He wishes he could bring the dogs in so that their presence would somehow breakthrough to Rose, but the hospital wouldn’t allow it in case they bumped her leg or tugged on the multiple wires and tubes she’s connected to.

Calum also had flower arrangements delivered so the whole room was vibrant and floral smelling. He made sure they were always roses, hoping it would pull his Rose back to him. They also brought a little bit of light in here; it’s been raining for the last three weeks. He never lets one of them wilt, if it looks like it’s starting to brown he orders a new arrangement. He doesn’t want any form of death happening in this room.

The TV is on low volume when Jane, Rose’s primary RN whisks inside.

“How’s our girl doing today?” Jane asks brightly. She appears next to Rose checking her tubes, stitches, IV drip and her leg.

“Okay I think. I think I’m going to try reading her some poetry again,” Calum says stroking the back of Rose’s hand with his fingers.

“I think your love story is so sweet,” Jane smiles poking the earpieces of her stethoscope in her ears. She nods to his guitar leaning against the window. “I haven’t heard you play that yet.”

Calum glances at the instrument that Luke brought over for him one day in the first week of Rose being admitted. Luke told him music is what brought him and his soulmate together, and the love Calum and Rose also shared of music was bound to ignite something within her.

“I don’t really want to play the melodies that are in my head,” Calum says picking up a poetry book that’s on the makeshift nightstand next to his cot bed. It’s a hospital table-top cart that holds his and Rose’s notebooks along with their poetry books. He shuffles through the pages, inked words flashing by quickly. “They’re all sad and I don’t want her to feel that.”

Jane nods tucking Rose’s plush periwinkle blanket back into place, so she stays warm.

“I understand. Everything looks good, I’ll be back in a few hours. Don’t forget to eat, Calum,” Jane reminds him with a pointed look.

“Thanks Jane,” Calum tries to give her a grin, but he can feel it’s more of a grimace. Jane walks back out of the room closing the door behind her and Calum sighs staring at Rose. “Should I read some poems to you, Rosie?”

The page he landed on was of a poem titled Bloom,

‘Someone once planted your name

like a seed in my heart.

Only now I’ve met you,

Do I know what it means to bloom.’

And below the printed words are Rose’s own, handwritten in her beautiful cursive. Calum traces the written words with a longing he knows will never go away. It reads:

Calum and I said ‘I love you’ to each other. Not many soulmates do that but after that night with the storm when we had sex for the first time…it felt right. Like my world finally clicked into place. I’ve read about love, seen it with my own eyes from friends and family but to feel it? Love is such a strong word, since we’ve both said it I feel it blooming within me. When I say his name it grows, when he says mine it doubles, and when we exchange ‘I love you’ it triples.

Calum remembers that night perfectly. The provocative prose he read to her lead to their lovemaking while the storm rumbled on outside. It mirrored the storm within him at wanting to declare his love to her, but he kept it inside in fear of losing her. He knew he loved her the first time they kissed up in her apartment, that this was everything he’s ever wanted. Rose is the muse he’s been writing and singing about for all these years.

A loud roar of thunder shook outside, and Calum glances out the rain streaked window as lightning flashes across the sky. It’s as if the universe knows his soulmate is in turmoil because the rain hasn’t let up at all. Glancing back at Rose, he hopes wherever she is that it’s sunshine and happy memories.

He closes the book then moves to the record player in the corner of the room. Their favorite record is already placed inside, and he turns it on. Frank Sinatra’s voice fills the room as he sings about the moon. Calum inspects the flowers making sure they all have their vibrant color before sitting back down on his cot.

He picks up his Michael Faudet book and reads Chasing Love out loud to her. When he’s finished, he stares at this poem for a long time as Frank’s voice ricochets off the walls. The first half is a little broody, two pathways meeting but not crossing. He’s thankful his path and Rose’s crossed—crashed actually. He’s reminded of the ghostly dream he had of this phantom woman a few years ago that teased him of knowing him in his ear. Turns out it was her all along.

The last line pulls at his heart ‘how sunshine steals from autumn frost.’ What a conundrum because his sunshine was stolen from him. Instead of frost and snow the sun was replaced with the rain and thunder brewing relentlessly outside.

He looks at his Rose, frozen in sleep, and he’s desperate for her to return to him. his throat works as he realizes how too close their situation resembles to the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty. His sweet, sweet Rose in a deep slumber.

Calum traces the area of the diamond on her finger. It’s become a bit loose and he takes in her appearance for the thousandth time. Her complexion is dry and thin compared to her usual warmth and softness. She’s void of color and abundance. Like the other times before when he’s felt her anger or her sadness, he tries to place what she’s feeling now but comes up blank. There’s a faint buzzing and a very distant lilt of music, but that’s all he can gather.

The red glow is dim but still there, so that has to be a good sign. Calum scoots closer and with careful fingers touches her hair that is also less in color and dry. Some of it is growing back in baby tufts around her stitches. He caresses her cheek; her skin is lukewarm. On a normal day, this action would have made her cheeks heat up in a light pink pigment, but they remain the same pallor.

“Come back to me, Rosie,” he whispers anxiously. He curls her cool, limp fingers in his. “I love you so much.”

On instinct, he glances back to her chest, the red glow is still the weak glimmer but it’s that little bit of light that urges his hope to press on. She will wake again.

Four Weeks Later

Ashton is sitting with him today like he has been every Monday and Wednesday prior. The record player plays absently in the background and Ashton watches his best friend cling to the love of his life. Their talk is minimal, the weather has been the same onslaught of rain so that’s always out. After Calum informs him of Rose’s condition it goes silent between them.

When the record stops Calum shifts to that part of the room and grabs their album placing it on the B side of the vinyl. He feels Ashton’s gaze on him the whole time.

“Lover of mine is her favorite,” Calum grins then sits back down next to her bed. He’s hoping the music will awaken her at some point. He has to find the right song.

“I hate seeing you like this, mate,” Ashton finally admits. “You’re wasting away being cooped up in here.”

“I’m staying until she wakes up.”

“You have to start thinking of the possibility that she might not…” Ashton’s voice tapers off morosely. Calum’s eyes flash in white hot fury.

“She’s going to wake up,” Calum says firmly. “She’s in there. She can hear me and I…I feel her.” He flicks his eyes back to her then takes her hand.

A few days ago, while he was reading to her, the buzzing he always heard quieted and the musical melody became louder.

“How?”

Calum hesitates, his thumb rubs the back of her hand. “We love each other,” he confesses and Ashton gasps. “And since we’ve said it we’ve had a…a connection. It’s a warmth and a-a glow in our chests and somehow it combined into one. She still has her glow and I have mine.”

“When—why didn’t you tell me?”

“It’s hard to explain and I know it’s not common for soulmates to say it to each other, because there isn’t really a need to but…I didn’t want you to think I was crazy.”

“I’d never think that. That’s incredible, man.”

They fall into a silence again. Ashton is still wrestling with the idea that even though Calum feels her, who knows how long it will be until she does wake up? He wants to be supportive of his friend, his brother, but it’s hard when he can see how harrowing this is for him.

He’s been stuck in this hotel for four weeks now, eating hospital food and never leaving. Calum has lost weight and he has dark circles under his eyes that never seem to go away. The similarities between Rose and Calum’s appearances is frightening but also adds truth to how Calum says he ‘feels’ her. Is he going through what Rose is?

Ruby arrives about an hour later with some take out food, her curls are dewed with droplets of the rain and her face falls when she catches sight of Rose and Calum. She looks to Ashton who nods; the two of them have discussed trying to get Calum to go home for a bit and today seems like a good time to do that.

“Hey Cal,” she greets him brightly setting the food bags on the table under the tv.

“Hey Rube,” he replies quietly, eyes never straying from Rose.

“What do you say about going home for a few hours?” She rubs her hands together trying to warm up from the cold rain. “Ash and I can stay here so you can shower and do some laundry.”

Calum turns to her stiffly, his brown eyes flat.

“I’m not leaving her, Ruby.”

“It’d only be for an hour or two,” she presses moving to the other side of Rose’s bed. She gazes at her own best friend, sadness welling up in her heart. “You don’t have to spend the night but just to stretch your legs, get a change of scenery.”

Calum licks his chapped lips, the thought of showering in his own bathroom is tempting. The one here gets the job done but he can feel the difference in comfort. He does have a pile of clothes in the corner that should be washed but the thought of leaving Rose tugs at his heart.

“What if something happens?”

“You know we’ll call you,” Ashton chimes in. “Rose would want you to take care of yourself, too.”

After careful thought he agrees, gathers his clothes then kisses Rose’s forehead. It’s clammy and each step away from her makes him feel horrible. It rises a panic in him he’s never felt before and it only increases when he gets in his car. The rain is a horrible reminder of the night of her accident when his world flipped upside down.

He’s anxious the whole car ride, it’s weird being in a vehicle after four weeks of staying in one place. He makes sure to keep both hands on the wheel as he drives not wanting to risk getting into an accident himself.

When he arrives home it’s dark and quiet without the welcoming of the dogs’ claws on the floor. He misses them and wants to see them at Mike’s house but that would make him be away from Rose longer and he couldn’t have that. Maybe he’ll go over there in a day or two.

The silence is deafening as he walks down the hall. He pauses at the Eiffel tower photos on the wall and gazes at each photo. Rose’s smile and the light in her eyes brings him both comfort and pain. Being home and out of the hospital makes him truly feel the huge weight on his shoulders

He tosses his clothes in the washer and pours in the desired amount of detergent. He selects a setting without reading it but sees it’s only for forty minutes. Good, the faster he can get back to the hospital the better.

Once inside the bathroom—he makes sure to avoid looking at their bed—he connects his phone to the Bluetooth speaker in the fan. Calum’s body feels heavier as he removes his clothes slowly, his arms like lead and his muscles throb.

He stands under the hot spray of water, breathing in the steam and letting it smooth out his strained muscles in his neck and shoulders. Memories of showers spent with Rose flood his mind. He always loved the way she’d stand behind him with her hands sliding up his chest as she kissed the space between his shoulder blades.

What he would give to have her behind him right now. If only he didn’t have to be at the venue early to set up for the show Rose would have been with him. She wouldn’t have had to drive by herself, she wouldn’t have been at that intersection and she wouldn’t be in the hospital right now.

The song changes and the all too familiar lyrics ‘remember the words you told me love me ‘til the day I die’ pierced Calum’s heart. His breath catches as the words sink in along with Ashton’s insinuation that she might not wake. Calum slams his palm against the wall, he continues to smack it until he feels the sharp pain shoot up his arm. He falls to the shower floor, water raining down on him as his sadness, hurt and confusion surface.

Calum feels so lost without Rose, his sobs bounce off the tile and drown out the music. He lets out a few shouts of rage to mask the song of hurt while his bleeds out. He’s not sure how long he sits on the shower floor before he cleans himself off and exits.

While he brushes his teeth, he stares at himself in the mirror barely recognizing the reflection. His cheeks have sunken in under the dark bags of his eyes. He’s so exhausted, sleeping on that cot isn’t as comfortable as his own bed. Calum replaces his wet clothes into the dryer, noting the time of an hour and a half. He shuffles back to his and Rose’s bedroom and falls onto the side that’s hers.

Her pillow still smells like her and tears well in Calum’s eyes at the all too familiar smell. He pulls the comforter over him, his eyes closing easily. He’ll just sleep until the dryer is done and he’ll be back at the hospital in two hours.

The next time Calum opens his eyes is due to a loud crack of thunder. He’s still on Rose’s side of the bed but facing the other way and his whole body feels rigid. His hand pats the bed until he finds his phone, the light makes his eyes strain and he blinks in confusion as he reads the time.

He slept for a whole day and a half. For a quick moment he forgot about the accident and thought he’d just come back from a tour. The phone drops to his chest as he rolls over to gaze at Rose but she’s not there. His small moment of bliss dissipates because he hasn’t been on tour in so long and reality sets in that Rose is back at the hospital.

He curses himself for falling asleep then stretches his limbs, the cracks of his joints are music to his ears and fill him with release. He lies in bed for a little while longer until he’s more awake then gets out slowly. His hair has dried oddly because it was wet when he dropped onto the mattress, but he doesn’t care. He has to get back to Rose.

When he arrives back at the hospital again, guilt ever present in his chest of being away from her so long, he finds there hasn’t been any change in her condition. Ashton and Ruby figured he fell asleep and were glad at how refreshed he looks. They stayed the night with Rose and he’s thankful for that but still feels awful for not sleeping next to her.

After catching up with Ashton and Ruby, they leave him with a kiss on the cheek from Ruby and a reassuring squeeze to his shoulder from Ashton. Calum kisses Rose’s forehead.

“Sorry for being away, sweetheart. Sleep took over me but I’m back now. Should I read some more to you?” he picks up a book and starts to read from Michael Faudet.

He stares at ‘The Northern Lights’ reminiscing about his and Rose’s own moment at the beach, much like what the poem is describing. He reads it out loud, twice then stares at Rose’s face.

“Remember that night at the beach, Rosie? The stars shone in your eyes and we got sand everywhere,” he smiles at the memory while Ronnie Hilton’s song ‘Stars Shine in your eyes’ plays just like that night.

It was a date night curated by Calum complete with a basket of food and a large blanket to lay in the sand. They were in a hidden spot unseen to other beachgoers with the perfect view of the ocean and the setting sun. It was twilight when he lit the candles for their dinner, feeding each other the small finger food with kisses exchanged in between each bite.

Rose pulled him to his feet so they could walk in the ocean for a little while, just until the sun disappeared below the horizon. When her feet became cold, she hopped on Calum’s back so he could carry her back to the blanket where he draped a second one over her legs while he got a fire started.

He remembers how he froze when he turned around to see her top off, a nipple peeking above the second blanket he gave her, and she flashed him the sweetest smile.

“Come warm me up?”

They created their own sunset between their hearts that night, the smell of ocean air and smoke clouded over their tangled limbs as they made love twice on the beach.

The loud ringing of his phone pulls him from the sweet reverie, he sees it’s his mom and he picks up right away. She asks if there has been any new progress with Rose and he tells her not yet and that she doesn’t have to come watch the dogs because Mike still has them. He promises he’ll call her when Rose does wake up.

He hangs up and is still thinking of the beach when he’s reminded of a poem Lang Leav wrote called ‘High Tide’. He goes to her book and reads out the first line.

“’Are you somewhere looking at the sea, my love?’ Is that where you are, Rosie? By the sea? The sand in your toes, salty seawater spraying your hair?” he chokes up as he gazes at her still face. He grabs her hand in his and kisses it. “Pick a pretty shell for me, okay? What should I read next?”

Five Weeks Later

It’s Thursday afternoon and Calum is doing the routine exercises for Rose, so she doesn’t get bed sores and her muscles don’t atrophy when Ruby enters the room. She is absolutely beaming, her eyes wide and bright accompanied with a huge smile on her face. Surprised at her elation, Calum’s first instinct is to look at her left-hand thinking Ashton proposed to her, but her hand is bare.

“Hey Rube, what’s up?” he asks bending Rose’s fingers down one by one, similar to the tactic of counting a child’s toes as little piggies.

“Ash and I said, ‘I love you.’”

“Really?!” Calum gives her a large smile then massages the palm of Rose’s hand. “That’s fantastic, how’d it happen?”

“We were making breakfast and he just said it,” she smiles breathlessly. “You and Rose were right about that warmth; I feel it everywhere…it’s like I’m floating on air.”

“That’s amazing. I’m so happy for you guys.” Calum sets Rose’s arm back down on the bed and moves down to her leg that’s not in a cast.

“We have you two to thank. Rose told me not to be scared and after what you told Ashton last week he said he’s been feeling different. I can’t wait to tell Rose.” Ruby smiles down sadly at her friend

“She’ll be happy to hear about it,” Calum smiles and lifts her leg to do the exercises. Dr. Robbins has said that her external fixator is doing a good job of healing her leg, it’s a slow process but with her current condition, slow is best.

Ruby recounts the whole moment for Calum while he continues the exercises with Rose. Ruby knew something was up because Ashton was being a bit moodier than normal and was acting nervous while they did their morning yoga session. It wasn’t until Ruby started their coffee and she asked for their two mugs did he say it after she said, ‘thank you.’

Calum knows Ashton will probably tell him about it when he comes to visit but it fills him with happiness that his two friends know of the same elation that he and Rose feel. When her exercises are done, and Jane has checked her vitals, Calum and Ruby sit down while he reads more poetry to Rose.

Before he’s about to go to sleep for the night he reads one more poem and notices all of Rose’s underlines in ‘A Letter to My Love’ starting with the word France and the rest as follows:

‘…how we pictured, but it is exactly how it was always meant to be.’

‘But building this life with you has been the grandest adventure.’

‘This is the happiest I have ever been.’

‘With you I have seen all my dreams to into fruition.’

‘All I ask now is for time with you, as much as we are allowed.’

He doesn’t like that last foreboding sentence, as if this time they’ve shared together is all they were allowed. This can’t be it for them. Then her handwriting appears on the page next to it dated the day they got engaged and of their graduation. She wrote an entry.

It’s the day after and Calum is sleeping next to me. He asked me to marry him! I woke up and opened to this poem, fate has been on m side since that day we bumped into each other outside the CBS. He’s my dream I’ve dreamt of since I was a little girl. There are many great loves, but non are greater than mine and his. I felt a flicker in my glow just now…excitement? You’re starting to mumble in your sleep my love, time to wake you up and celebrate our life of forever.

Calum stares at her phrase of ‘flicker in my glow’ did she somehow know about the accident before it even happened? Why else would it flicker? He shifts his gaze to her chest and the red glow is still there, still faint, but no sign of flickering.

Six Weeks Later

Calum is dreaming. Somewhere in his mind, he knows it but won’t wake. He and Rose are at the Dainty Dove. She’s leaning against him in their regular booth with his arm around her shoulders as they share a cup of coffee. She smiles like her familiar rose and rainwater smell; Moonlight Serenade by Frank Sinatra plays softly in the background from the jukebox. Their song from their very first date and they’re the only ones in the joint.

“It’s almost time,” she says twisting her fingers with his.

“Time for what?” he kisses her hair, breathing her in.

“The rain…it’s coming here. I am too.”

“What do you mean?”

“Come dance,” she whispers and then suddenly they’re dancing.

The room darkens as clouds roll over outside the restaurant. Calum watches over Rose’s head through the windows in confusion. Rose touches his cheek and he looks down at her.

“Promise me something,” she says.

“Anything.”

“Be patient with me. The rain is coming,” she whispers, and his dream self is befuddled as she leans up on her toes, lips brushing his, “and I’m in close proximity.”

Just before her lips touch his, the rain falls heavily, and her voice lingers in his mind when he wakes up. Just like in his dream, the rain is hitting the windows harshly much like it has been for the last six weeks. The weatherman are calling it an unnatural weather phenomenon and have no real answer for the source of all the rain.

He checks that the time is 4:37 a.m. He rubs his eyes then jerks to a sitting position because Rose’s chest is glowing a burning red with much more strength. It isn’t dim at all, it’s vibrant and strong.

“Rose?!” his legs get tangled in the hospital sheets as he turns on the lights and he swears he sees her eyelashes twitch. “Rosie, baby?” he takes her hand. “Can you hear me? I’m right here, in prox…”

Calum swallows harshly then snatches up his Michael Faudet book opening to the poem titled ‘Proximity.’ He reads the prose quickly about joining the dots from A to B, empty shores and the sea and everything else in between all the way to the end.

‘For what’s real is meant to be, when two hearts beat—in proximity.’

Rose’s finger twitches against his and Calum’s heart skyrockets.

“Rose?” he whispers in shock. “Come on sweetheart, open your eyes for me. I’m right here. I’m here and I love you so much.” He gasps when the orange glow in his chest brightens and her does as well from his proclamation of love. Tears spring in his eyes then two more fingers twitch. “Rose, I’m here. I love you; I love you, come back to me, Rosie.”

Their glows blaze brighter still, something beeps but Calum pays it no mind because Rose’s eyes flutter for a few seconds and then open. Calum stares in astonishment, oh how he’s missed those ocean eyes.

“Rose?” he whispers. She blinks heavily and he’s smashing the nurse’s call button. “She’s awake! Jane! She’s opened her eyes!” he shouts into the speaker then takes her hand in both of his. Happy tears are falling down his cheeks as she comes to. “Hi sweetheart, I’m right here, you’re okay.”

She tries to focus on him, her mouth tries to open to speak but then she chokes on the feeding tube and he panics. He starts shouting some more for help then Jane and Dr. Robbins rush in. They’re quick to remove the tube and fix the alarms screaming on the machines. Jane pushes Calum gently out of the way so they can work, and other nurses arrive in the room.

“Rose, I’m Dr. Robbins,” Dr. Robbins speaks very slowly and clearly, as if she’s talking to a child. “You’re in the hospital and were in an accident. You’ve been asleep for a while but you’re okay.” She flashes a light in her eyes. “Good. Can you blink twice if you understand me?”

Calum watches in amazement as Rose blinks once…then twice ever so slowly. He could leap for joy.

“That’s good,” Dr. Robbins smiles warmly, “You’ve been in a coma for some time so things may be fuzzy. Are you in pain? Blink once for no and twice for yes.”

Rose blinks twice and Calum’s heart plummets. Has she been in silent pain all this time?

“Jane can help with that, she’s your nurse,” Dr. Robbins smiles again. “I’m going to do some quick tests okay?”

While Dr. Robbins does her testing Calum’s fingers are flying as he texts everyone in excitement. He would call but he can’t take his eyes off Rose and it’s extremely early in the morning. He didn’t want to alarm them in a panic when it was actually good news.

***

A few days have gone by, Calum watches silently as Rose goes through more tests to see how well her reflexes are and her strength. Calum only leaves when he gets a phone call from their friends or his mom to give them updates and share their excitement of her finally being awake. Her eyes are always on him with a twinge of confusion in her dark blue eyes. When she speaks, it’s soft and raspy but it’s the voice of angels to Calum. He’s missed her voice so much.

“I know you want to be alone with him, but I have to make sure you’re all right. He won’t go anywhere, I promise,” Dr. Robbins chuckles while she watches the orthopedic doctor check Rose’s leg.

Calum hopes she’ll be able to get the mechanical thing off her now and they can work on physical therapy so she can walk. He knows her recovery process is going to be long and strenuous. She’s been in a coma for six weeks; her body is stiff and probably feels weird to her, but Calum will be with her every step of the way.

Calum takes a step forward, smile on his face at being acknowledged by Dr. Robbins. Rose’s brows furrow in a concerned v.

“Who is he?”

The rain stops, and the clouds part to reveal a bright sun that shines in Rose’s eyes. The bad weather has ceased, and Calum should be happy that the light of his life is back, but a new storm has arrived as Rose stares at Calum like she’s never seen him before in her life.

• • • •

Taglist: @galcalirwin @cashtonasff5sos @thecurlsofgod @myloverboyash @rotten-kandy @tea4sykes @jannimoeller3 @loveroflrh @iovehemmings @cxddlyash @princesslrh @here-for-the-uproars @katiaw2 @g-l-pierce @fairyintheglass @gosh-im-short @banditocth @dezzym17 @koalacal @lukeisbaby @spicycal @mysticalhood @notinthesameguey @wastedheartcth @atlcalm @itjustkindahappenedreally @calumance @babylon-corgis @thew0rldneedsmcreycghurt @lanternlover2 @istaywithmyjonas @calteahood @sarcastically-defensive17 @another-lonely-heart @devilatmydoor @frontmanash @philthepegacorn @mantlereid @lukedorkyhemmings @addietagglikesbands @kikixfandoms @sanrioluke @mayve-hems @morguelth @haikucal @thatscooibaby @meghanrose05 @idontneedanyone @dinosaursandsocks @cassie-sos @suchalonelysunflower @burstintocolor @zhangyixingxing1 @dead-and-golden @mymindwide @everyscarisahealingplace @stardust-galaxies @blackbutterfliescal @redrattlers @lovelybonesetc @karajaynetoday @quasighost @i-like-5sos

#calum hood au #soulmate!calum #soulmate!calum hood #calum hood angst #calum hood fic #calum hood writing #calum writing #calum angst #soulmate!cal

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blookmallow · 3 years ago

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i dont remember if i mentioned it before but i decided to join the thieves guild after all

---

i forgot all about this cool grave in the riften graveyard that looked Significant and i never figured out why BUT TURNS OUT IT’S THE THIEVES GUILD SECRET ENTRANCE. WHICH IS COOL AS SHIT. and also seems extremely obvious in hindsight. even if most people in skyrim don’t know shadowmarks and don’t recognize the thieves guild symbol, The Single Most Conspicuous Grave in the whole graveyard, which doesn’t appear to actually contain any real grave, and the whole thing like. slides open very loudly when you activate it. how does no one see us going in and out from here. isn’t anyone curious what this grave is for. has no one pressed the button out of curiosity and gotten in here by accident

i know i as the player can’t interact with it until i know about it but in-universe it should still work even if you don’t know what it is

the what

Who Are You

apparently i saved this guy from the thalmor at some point lmao i have no idea when that happened

there’s some papers very conspicuously hidden under an end table next to one of the beds in the guild hq and i cannot figure out any way to interact with them, its driving me out of my mind it HAS to mean something but i can’t see it

what. im the dark brotherhood why havent i been informed of this

i still dont think the guild realizes im the leader of the dark brotherhood lmfao i dont exactly have an option to like. tell them. i mean, delvin knows, but

sapphire is glover’s daughter???

i love being in the thieves guild im learning all kinds of things about people

i should have made the connection sooner that... glover mallory. delvin mallory. of course they’re brothers. but i didnt notice and didn’t know the shadowmarks yet, so

i dont remember what i was doing here. this might’ve been honeyglow estate or whatever its called? i dont know. i was infiltrating a place to steal something and this guy was just like. hiding in his room in the corner. he didn’t see me bc im a stealth master at this point so i dunno what he would have done if he had seen me but like. you okay there man

SPIDER CONTROL ROD????

look at it... a baby....

i actually ended up doing this section like 8 times reloading a save bc A) ive been playing the thieves guild missions as like “kill as few people as possible/try to not be seen at all” as a personal challenge and because they keep saying “we dont kill people thats not how we work” so im tryin to follow the thieves code here but i kept fucking it up and anyway i could NOT figure out how to use the spider without getting it murdered in like 3 seconds. i wanted to take the spider control rod and have a spider friend but it seems like the only thing you can do is make it run to its death immediately so i ultimately ended up just leaving it there :’<

maybe one day i will go back for it just to own the Spider Control Rod if nothing else. i dont even remember what i was doing in here in the first place i know i was stealing Something Important

i still feel bad about betraying calcelmo hes my friend but like, i dont think he knows i was the one who broke in here

would love to know why theres so much blood here in his secret dwarf research lab or whatever this was, but

who threw an entire coin purse in this fountain. do you not know how tossing coins in fountains works

#lucy plays skyrim #scooby dooby queue

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wonderful-writer · 4 years ago

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14 - Mount Weather

Summary: Y/n finds herself in a new place, becoming suspicious of it and it’s motives very quickly. Clarke shares the same suspicion, and both become weary about the safety of the people that didn’t make it into the dropship.

Word Count: 3.90k

Based Off: 02x01, “The 48”

Your eyes fluttered open to an all white room, the brightness stinging your eyes. You closed them tightly again and put your hand over them to block out some of the light, adjusting your eyes to see what was in the room. You sat up in the bed, noticing that you were clean and no longer caked with dirt and blood. Your clothes had been changed, and there was no pain or knife protruding from your backside.

The room was all white. The sheets, walls, floors, couch, and door were the same shade. However, the only thing that was different was the painting hung up on the wall. It was one of the paintings you recognized from art class as the very famous painting of Napoleon Crossing the Alps. You looked at the painting for a few seconds longer before moving to the door, which had a window showing you the hallway.

The thing that had caught your attention was the sign on the opposite wall, which read “Mount Weather quarantine ward”. You looked at the door opposite to you to see the window was empty, but it looked like someone was in there because of the messed up pillows on the bed.

As the memories of the previous night flooded back to you, you began to panic. Bellamy and Finn were gone, possibly dead, and whoever brought you here fixed your stab wound and possibly took the others as well. You couldn’t see any of the other 100, and the thought reached you that you were the only one left.

If there really was no one from the Ark left alive and you were the only one, how was everything going to go after this? How were you going to get out of wherever you were and live without the grounders attempting to kill you at every turn?

Everything blurred and you felt tears filling your eyes as you stumbled, pressing yourself against the nearest wall and sliding down it, gripping your hair, which was no longer in braids, and attempting to control this raging panic attack with no one to help you. Your breaths came out shakily and your eyes remained squeezed shut, forcing yourself to think the exact opposite of what you just were in order to get your mind to stop racing.

You felt time slipping away as you stayed there, before the rage of being all alone and without information took over. You slammed your hands on the floor and pushed yourself up onto your feet, breathing heavily.

You grabbed the first object you could, that being the IV drip, and throwing whatever bags were on it at the door, the saline spilling down it and pooling on the floor. Then you kicked the tray of medical supplies over, the instruments clattering to the floor loudly, and you made swift movements to the room separator, throwing it to the ground, listening to the loud clunk it made when it hit the linoleum floor.

In the small break of silence you faintly heard glass shattering, but chose to ignore it. You grabbed the pole that the IV bags were hanging off of and ran to the door, shattering the window as your feet stepped in the puddle of saline at the door. You hit the doorknob multiple times, to the point where both the metal rod and the doorknob were dented.

You moved back, taking a running start at the door, trying to ram it open with the IV pole. You, however, slipped in the saline and glass puddle as you were running, causing you to knock all of the air out of your lungs when you fell over, and feel the familiar ripping of stitches; along with a brand new horizontal cut on your forearm, near the scar Murphy gave you, from a large shard of glass that you landed on.

The IV pole in your hands fell on top of you as you fell, hitting you on the forehead and blurring your vision, as well as sending a dull throb through your head. You watched the bright room grow dimmer, your vision fading back into black as you passed out. Again.

You woke back up in a different room, one that wasn’t white. You tried to cover your eyes with your hand to block out the light as they adjusted, but your hands were restricted.

“Y/n?” You heard Clarke’s voice.”Y/n wake up!”

You opened your eyes and saw that you couldn’t move your hands because they were tied down, one restraint just barely overlapping with a bandage they put on for your new cut. You looked to your left to see Clarke sitting on the bed next to you, also restrained, but sitting up.

You did the best you could to do the same, the restraints holding you back. You heard the door hiss open on your right, watching as two guards, a woman in a lab coat, an older man, and a girl came in, along with another guard.

“Hello, Clarke,” The woman greeted. “How’s your arm?”

Clarke didn’t say anything in response. The woman took a glance at you to see you also awake. “Hello, Y/n, I see you’re awake, too. How are you feeling?”

You did the same as Clarke and just stared at the woman.

“They’re not very talkative, are they?” She commented.

“A skill they picked up from the savages, no doubt.” The elderly man said. “Maya has something to say to Clarke first anyway.”

The girl that came in with the rest of them looked up at Clarke, almost scared of her. “You were the next one to be cleared through quarantine. Another 10 minutes and you would’ve-” She was cut off by the older man clearing his throat.

“And then it was supposed to be her.” She looked at you for a second and then turned back to Clarke. “I’m not pressing charges.” “Thank you, Maya.” The old man said. “You can get your treatment now.”

The doctor directed Maya to a bed and the older man looked to the guards. “Restraints aren’t necessary. On either of them.”

One guard came to untie you and the other went to Clarke. Once the restraints were off, you came to sit at the edge of the bed like Clarke.

“Dante Wallace,” He introduced himself to Clarke, extending a hand for her to shake. She grabbed it to inspect the black smudges on his hand.

“Oil paint,” He said. “That’s right. You’re an artist too.”

Clarke stood up and asked him who told him that.

“Your people.” He said. “They also said you and Y/n here were their leaders.” You stood up and went to stand beside Clarke.

“Looks like you two and I have a lot in common, kiddos.” You looked apprehensively to Clarke, who looked back at you the same way.

“Where’s my watch?” Clarke asked. It was then that you noticed the cool metal of your locket wasn’t present on your chest.

“And my locket?” You asked. “What did you do with it?”

“I’m sorry, but we can’t let contaminated items inside Mount Weather. We couldn’t risk it.” He told you. “Our protocol is very strict. We prioritize safety over sentimentality.”

“That was the only thing I had left of my mother! The only picture of her and my father are both in there you asshole!” You started to get angry again, but Clarke’s assuring yet sad eyes stopped you from going any further.

“How many of us did you capture?” Clarke asked, pulling her eyes away from the machine that Maya was hooked up to. You kept your gaze on it, too, curious.

“48, including both of you. But, Clarke, you’ve got it wrong. You’re not prisoners. We saved you.” Dante assured her.

“Well, in that case, you won’t mind if we leave.” You said. “If there are 48 of us here, we still have people out there.”

“The patrol brought in everyone they could find,” Dante told you.

“What about the Ark? I saw it come down last night.” Clarke asked.

“We saw it,” Dante said. “There were multiple crash sites over 100 square miles. If there were survivors, we will bring them in, too. You have my word.”

“We want to see our people.” Clarke decided.

“Of course, you do. I would too.” Dante motioned for two guards behind him to roll forward a crate, opening it to reveal an array of clothing and jewellery. You and Clarke marvelled at the sight as Dante spoke again.

“Change and meet me in the hall.” He and the guards left the room, leaving you and Clarke to choose what clothing suited you.

She chose a pink shirt with a turquoise sports jacket over it and some blue pants that didn’t quite reach the bottom of her calf, along with some simple sneakers. You, however, grabbed a white shirt and some black leggings, with a jacket that was similar to Clarke’s but was black instead of her turquoise and running shoes similar to hers.

She ran her fingers along the shoes before she put hers on, picking up a pair of heels and handing one to you. You followed her actions by snapping off the heel and slipping it underneath your jacket sleeve, ready to use when needed.

You pushed open the door and saw Dante waiting for the both of you with about 4 guards standing by. The room was very noisy as you walked up to him.

“Sorry about the noise!” He yelled as you started walking. “Hydroelectric power from the Philpott dam. Fresh water from our own underground reservoir.”

“Fresh food from our hydroponic farm,” He said.

“I don’t understand,” Clarke shook her head. “You’re on the ground, you know it’s survivable. Why would you stay here?”

“It’s not survivable for us,” Dante told you.

“The grounders seem to have managed.” You said.

“Natural selection works,” Dante replied. “The grounders who couldn’t survive in the radiation didn’t. Those who could passed on their DNA. For better or for worse, here, we never went through that process.”

“Well, neither did we,” Clarke said. “We’ve been on the ground now for…”

“Solar radiation.” You continued her sentence, coming to the same realization.

“Very good.” Dante smiled. “Your DNA ran the same gauntlet as the grounders. Only because radiation levels in space are even higher, your ability to metabolize that radiation is even stronger.”

You stopped at an elevator and waited for it to come up, Dante still speaking to you and Clarke. “Truth be told, our scientists were blown away with the efficiency of your systems. If not for that, your friends would still be upstairs in quarantine.”

“I have a question,” You said. Dante looked at you and nodded for you to continue. “I wasn’t with the others. I was near the front gate with a knife sticking out of my back. How did I end up here?”

“Well,” Dante responded. “Our patrol found you outside the gate not long after we got there and bought you in with them. And it was a good thing that we did, too. You were almost dead when you got here.”

You nodded and the elevator doors creaked open, Dante allowing you and Clarke to enter the elevator. You both entered hesitantly, watching Dante as the doors began to close. Dante stopped them and held out his hand.

“First, give me the heels.” You looked at Clarke in shock, but reluctantly pulled the heel from your sleeve, pressing it into Dante’s palm with Clarke.

“You’re not fighting for your life anymore, girls. You’ve made it. Welcome to Mount Weather.” The elevator doors closed and brought you both to level 5, the guards escorting you. Clarke began to walk towards the small crowd, where you heard a woman talking.

“Your packet contains everything you need to know about Mount Weather, which I promise isn’t as confusing as the map on page one makes it out to look. You came from level 3, which houses our medical facility including…”

The woman's voice was drowned by your Monty’s, saying yours and Clarke’s name. He ran towards you and enveloped Clarke in a hug, while Jasper came to you.

“I thought you were dead,” He whispered. Once they both let go of you, you hugged Monty and Jasper hugged Clarke, the other delinquents coming to greet you.

“Finn?” Clarke asked.

“And Bellamy?” You asked.

“Y/n they uh… they didn’t make it.” Jasper whispered.

“We don’t know that,” Clarke assured everyone. “What about Raven?”

The silence was enough of an answer, the crowd breaking to let the woman you heard before come to meet you.

“Welcome Clarke, Y/n.” She greeted you. “If you have any questions, I’m Keenan.”

She handed you both packets and walked away with a smile. Your head was spinning. You didn’t know what to think, what to do. Things felt weird around here and you just wanted to go back to the dropship.

Clarke opened up the packet and looked at the map. You took a glance at it from her packet, not bothered to open your own, the map confusing you.

Later in the day, you were back in the dining hall for lunch, which was the best food you’d ever eaten. While the food was nice, you were still on edge about Mount Weather. Something seemed off. You sat next to Monty as he and Jasper ate dessert, Jasper offering his pie to Monty to try some.

“My turn,” Jasper said, pointing to the cake on Monty’s plate.

“This? Nah. You won’t like it. The pie is way better.” Monty brushed Jasper off and you giggled under your breath, knowing he was keeping it to himself because he didn’t want Jasper to have any. Jasper eyed Monty’s plate and tried to take it, but Monty was quicker.

“Really?” He asked and Monty nodded, fighting a smile.

They both stood up, dishes clattering, ready to fight for the chocolate cake. Monty moved to the left and Jasper copied, then they both moved to the right and stopped abruptly, seeing Clarke approach the table.

“Hey, Clarke,” Jasper greeted.

“Sit down and pretend you’re happy to see me.” She whispered, sitting down next to Jasper.

“We are happy to see you,” Monty told her, mouth full of chocolate cake.He offered some to Clarke and you laughed as your brother put on a look of fake betrayal.

“I’m not eating their food.” Clarke told him, her eyes on Dante at the head table. She pulled out her packet and showed the map to the three of you.

“Look,” She said. “They gave us a map with no exits. I need you to tell me everything you’ve seen. Every room, every hallway, every way out.”

“Way out?” Jasper asked. “Look around you, Clarke. There’s no one hunting us here. First time in our lives we’re not hungry. Why would we want to leave?”

“Because we have friends out there who need our help.”

“They’re looking for survivors,” Monty assured her. “And they’re way better equipped to find them than we are.”

“I think she’s right,” You jumped in. “This place, it’s too good to be true. I don’t trust it.”

“You guys are bumming me out. I’m-- I’m gonna get more cake.” Jasper laughed lightly and took his plate as he stood up, making his way to the dessert table.

You watched him interact with the girl that Clarke attacked earlier, a smile making its way to your face. Clarke watched him, too, an idea springing to her head. She took her packet and looked at you, motioning her head for you to follow her. You both stood up and walked over to Maya and Jasper.

“Hey,” Clarke put her packet on the table. “It’s Maya, right? I just wanted to say sorry, for this morning. I was scared and worried about my friends; I hope you can understand that.”

Maya smiled and nodded, still anxious to be around Clarke, who picked up her packet and walked away, the both of you smiling at Jasper and Maya beforehand. Clarke discreetly revealed that she had swiped Maya’s keycard when she left, slipping it in her pocket.

Not long after you left, alarms started blaring throughout the white hallway you were walking down, bright yellow lights flashing at the door behind you.

“Not a prisoner, huh?” Clarke muttered as you both took off down the hall.

You came to an intersection, looking to your left to see armed guards running towards you, and even more coming from your right. You kept running straight, zig zagging to throw off the guards, until you reached a rusty door. Clarke swiped Maya’s card on the keypad and you helped her pull open the door, slipping inside and pulling it shut.

You looked around and were met with stairs going up and down, you starting to go up as Clarke disabled the keypads and followed after you. You stopped at the first level, opening the door and coming to a stop at the beginning of a hallway. There was a large, round door at the end of it, and you and Clarke ran to it.

She tried pulling the lever beside it, but to no avail. She smacked the concrete wall in front of her and you looked at the door, seeing a hatch on it. You both moved to it and began to turn it, hearing a loud clunk after a few turns.

Clarke moved back to the lever and you put a hand on it as well. Just as you were about to pull it and open the door, Jasper and Maya stopped you.

“Clarke, no!” Jasper yelled. “If you pull that lever, these people will die. Even a little radiation could kill them.”

“Don’t make me shoot you,” Maya said, shakily holding a gun up to the both of you.

“Wait,” Jasper said, standing in front of Maya with his hands out, walking up to you and Clarke. “Don’t do this.”

“I don’t believe them,” Clarke shook her head.

“Why would they lie?” Jasper asked. “Listen to me. We are safe here. Because of you guys, we’re safe.”

“Not all of us,” You said.

“I’m the one that fired the rockets, should I not have done that?” Jasper asked. “Clarke, when you pulled that lever, you saved lives. Don’t throw that away by pulling this one.”

You and Clarke let go of the lever, sniffling and trying to prevent the tears from escaping your eyes. Bellamy was out there, he was out there with Finn, and you couldn’t get to him. The guards came barrelling in, Jasper raising his hands and moved to the side to let the guards through.

You put up no fight as they shoved you to the ground along with Clarke to handcuff you. Two guards guided Clarke down the halls, while another two guided you, a hand on each elbow as they brought you into Dante’s office.

“Lose the handcuffs,” He instructed the guards as he painted. “There’s a blank canvas if you’d like,” He offered to Clarke, who shook her head.

“I used to paint the ground, too.” Clarke told Dante.

“It’s not just the ground,” He said. “It’s a memory.”

“You’ve been outside?” You asked curiously.

“Yes. 56 years ago, for 5 minutes.” He said. “I was 7 when the first of what we call the outsiders appeared. Before that, we thought we were all there was. Imagine our surprise.”

“We don’t have to imagine,” Clarke replied.

“My father- this was his office at the time- believed it meant that the earth was survivable again, and so he opened the doors.” He recalled. “Within a week, 54 people were dead from the exposure. My mother and sister among them.”

He turned to put his paint brushes and pallet away, facing the both of you. “Loss… pain, regret. Time eases these things, girls, but the only time it’s ever truly gone is when I’m painting.”

He took off his jacket and placed it on the chair as Clarke looked around. “You didn’t bring us here to talk about painting, did you?”

“I’m afraid I have bad news.” He stopped on the other side of his paint cart. “Our patrols have swept the area and found no evidence of survivors, either at the camp or from the Ark.”

“How can they be sure?” You asked, shaking your head.

“They can’t,” Dante replied. “I’ve ordered them to keep searching.”

“We need to see for ourselves.” Clarke demanded.

“I’m sorry, I can’t allow that.” Dante denied. “I’m doing this for your own good, girls. It’s not safe out there.”

“Radiation has no effect on us. “ Clarke rebutted.

“It’s not the radiation I’m concerned about,” Dante motioned for the guards to come back in. “You need time to grieve. These men will show you to your room.”

“And if we try to leave?” You asked.

“Please don’t test me, girls.” Dante said.

Sighing, you turned and followed after Clarke, who left the room just before you. You tried not to think about the patrols not finding any survivors, but there was nothing you could do but that. The silent walk to the bedroom tore you apart on the inside as your thoughts collected and got worse and worse by the minute.

Soon after you were brought back to the room where the rest of the 48 were sleeping, you were brought back to the dining hall for dinner. Everyone stood at the table and joined hands, you between Clarke and Jasper as everyone said a prayer.

“For the past and the future we serve,” Dante said.

“We give thanks.” The room replied.

“Good health, good food, and good company. And the blessing of new friends.”

“We give thanks.” Everyone sat down to eat, digging into a wonderful beef stew. The thoughts of Bellamy and Finn loomed in the back of your mind, but you pushed it away and focused on talking with Jasper and eating.

Afterwards, back in the shared room, you sat on a bunk with Harper, who talked about how amazing everything was in here. “They have actually tasteful food, here, Y/n! I mean, the clothes could be a little nicer but I’m not complaining.”

You nodded absentmindedly, and Harper caught on. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I am, it’s just…” You trailed off.

“Bellamy?”

“Yeah. It’s worrying me that I don’t know where he is, or if he’s even alive, I just-- I need to know if he’s okay.” You ranted. “And these people haven’t found anything yet but I need to go look for myself but they won’t let me.”

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Harper put a hand on your arm. “He’s Bellamy, the guy can survive anything. You will see him again, Y/n. But for now, we need to get some sleep.”

You smiled at Harper and gave her a hug. “Thanks for that, Harper. I needed it.”

You got up from her bottom bunk and climbed the ladder to the top one, slipping under the blanket as Harper did. Your hair splayed across the pillow and you tossed and turned, trying to get to sleep.

“May we meet again,” You whispered into the air, tucking your hand under your cheek and closing your eyes, hoping for the day you reunite with Bellamy to come soon.

#bellamy blake #bellamy blake imagine #bellamy blake series #bellamy blake x reader #bellamy blake x you #bellamy blake x y/n #this is war series

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chiefbelieverstarlight · 3 years ago

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“The Garden of Janus”

I The cloud my bed is tinged with blood and foam. The vault yet blazes with the sun Writhing above the West, brave hippodrome Whose gladiators shock and shun As the blue night devours them, crested comb Of sleep's dead sea That eats the shores of life, rings round eternity! II So, he is gone whose giant sword shed flame Into my bowels; my blood's bewitched; My brain's afloat with ecstasy of shame. That tearing pain is gone, enriched By his life-spasm; but he being gone, the same Myself is gone Sucked by the dragon down below death's horizon. III I woke from this. I lay upon the lawn; They had thrown roses on the moss With all their thorns; we came there at the dawn, My lord and I; God sailed across The sky in's galleon of amber, drawn By singing winds While we wove garlands of the flowers of our minds. IV All day my lover deigned to murder me, Linking his kisses in a chain About my neck; demon-embroidery! Bruises like far-ff mountains stain The valley of my body of ivory! Then last came sleep. I wake, and he is gone; what should I do but weep? V Nay, for I wept enough --- more sacred tears! --- When first he pinned me, gripped My flesh, and as a stallion that rears, Sprang, hero-thewed and satyr-lipped; Crushed, as a grape between his teeth, my fears; Sucked out my life And stamped me with the shame, the monstrous word of wife. VI I will not weep; nay, I will follow him Perchance he is not far, Bathing his limbs in some delicious dim Depth, where the evening star May kiss his mouth, or by the black sky's rim He makes his prayer To the great serpent that is coiled in rapture there. VII I rose to seek him. First my footsteps faint Pressed the starred moss; but soon I wandered, like some sweet sequestered saint, Into the wood, my mind. The moon Was staggered by the trees; with fierce constraint Hardly one ray Pierced to the ragged earth about their roots that lay. VIII I wandered, crying on my Lord. I wandered Eagerly seeking everywhere. The stories of life that on my lips he squandered Grew into shrill cries of despair, Until the dryads frightened and dumfoundered Fled into space --- Like to a demon-king's was grown my maiden face! XI At last I came unto the well, my soul In that still glass, I saw no sign Of him, and yet --- what visions there uproll To cloud that mirror-soul of mine? Above my head there screams a flying scroll Whose word burnt through My being as when stars drop in black disastrous dew. X For in that scroll was written how the globe Of space became; of how the light Broke in that space and wrapped it in a robe Of glory; of how One most white Withdrew that Whole, and hid it in the lobe Of his right Ear, So that the Universe one dewdrop did appear. IX Yea! and the end revealed a word, a spell, An incantation, a device Whereby the Eye of the Most Terrible Wakes from its wilderness of ice To flame, whereby the very core of hell Bursts from its rind, Sweeping the world away into the blank of mind. XII So then I saw my fault; I plunged within The well, and brake the images That I had made, as I must make - Men spin The webs that snare them - while the knee Bend to the tyrant God - or unto Sin The lecher sunder! Ah! came that undulant light from over or from under? XIII It matters not. Come, change! come, Woe! Come, mask! Drive Light, Life, Love into the deep! In vain we labour at the loathsome task Not knowing if we wake or sleep; But in the end we lift the plumed casque Of the dead warrior; Find no chaste corpse therein, but a soft-smiling whore. XIV Then I returned into myself, and took All in my arms, God's universe: Crushed its black juice out, while His anger shook His dumbness pregnant with a curse. I made me ink, and in a little book I wrote one word That God himself, the adder of Thought, had never heard. XV It detonated. Nature, God, mankind Like sulphur, nitre, charcoal, once Blended, in one annihilation blind Were rent into a myriad of suns. Yea! all the mighty fabric of a Mind Stood in the abyss, Belching a Law for "That" more awful than for "This." XVI Vain was the toil. So then I left the wood And came unto the still black sea, That oily monster of beatitude! ('Hath "Thee" for "Me," and "Me" for "Thee!") There as I stood, a mask of solitude Hiding a face Wried as a satyr's, rolled that ocean into space. XVII Then did I build an altar on the shore Of oyster-shells, and ringed it round With star-fish. Thither a green flame I bore Of phosphor foam, and strewed the ground With dew-drops, children of my wand, whose core Was trembling steel Electric that made spin the universal Wheel. XVIII With that a goat came running from the cave That lurked below the tall white cliff. Thy name! cried I. The answer that gave Was but one tempest-whisper - "If!" Ah, then! his tongue to his black palate clave; For on soul's curtain Is written this one certainty that naught is certain! XIX So then I caught that goat up in a kiss. And cried Io Pan! Io Pan! Io Pan! Then all this body's wealth of ambergris, (Narcissus-scented flesh of man!) I burnt before him in the sacrifice; For he was sure - Being the Doubt of Things, the one thing to endure! XX Wherefore, when madness took him at the end, He, doubt-goat, slew the goat of doubt; And that which inward did for ever tend Came at the last to have come out; And I who had the World and God to friend Found all three foes! Drowned in that sea of changes, vacancies, and woes! XXI Yet all that Sea was swallowed up therein; So they were not, and it was not. As who should sweat his soul out through the skin And find (sad fool!) he had begot All that without him that he had left in, And in himself All he had taken out thereof, a mocking elf! XXII But now that all was gone, great Pan appeared. Him then I strove to woo, to win, Kissing his curled lips, playing with his beard, Setting his brain a-shake, a-spin, By that strong wand, and muttering of the weird That only I Knew of all souls alive or dead beneath the sky. XXIII So still I conquered, and the vision passed. Yet still was beaten, for I knew Myself was He, Himself, the first and last; And as an unicorn drinks dew From under oak-leaves, so my strength was cast Into the mire; For all I did was dream, and all I dreamt desire. XXIV More; in this journey I had clean forgotten The quest, my lover. But the tomb Of all these thoughts, the rancid and the rotten, Proved in the end to be my womb Wherein my Lord and lover had begotten A little child To drive me, laughing lion, into the wanton wild! XXV This child hath not one hair upon his head, But he hath wings instead of ears. No eyes hath he, but all his light is shed Within him on the ordered sphere Of nature that he hideth; and in stead Of mouth he hath One minute point of jet; silence, the lightning path! XXVI Also his nostrils are shut up; for he Hath not the need of any breath; Nor can the curtain of eternity Cover that head with life or death. So all his body, a slim almond-tree, Knoweth no bough Nor branch nor twig nor bud, from never until now. XXVII This thought I bred within my bowels, I am. I am in him, as he in me; And like a satyr ravishing a lamb So either seems, or as the sea Swallows the whale that swallows it, the ram Beats its own head Upon the city walls, that fall as it falls dead. XXVIII Come, let me back unto the lilied lawn! Pile me the roses and the thorns, Upon this bed from which he hath withdrawn! He may return. A million morns May follow that first dire daemonic dawn When he did split My spirit with his lightnings and enveloped it! XXIX So I am stretched out naked to the knife, My whole soul twitching with the stress Of the expected yet surprising strife, A martyrdom of blessedness. Though Death came, I could kiss him into life; Though Life came, I Could kiss him into death, and yet nor live nor die! XXX Yet I that am the babe, the sire, the dam, Am also none of these at all; For now that cosmic chaos of I AM Bursts like a bubble. Mystical The night comes down, a soaring wedge of flame Woven therein To be a sign to them who yet have never been. XXXI The universe I measured with my rod. The blacks were balanced with the whites; Satan dropped down even as up soared God; Whores prayed and danced with anchorites. So in my book the even matched the odd: No word I wrote Therein, but sealed it with the signet of the goat. XXXII This also I seal up. Read thou herein Whose eyes are blind! Thou may'st behold Within the wheel (that alway seems to spin All ways) a point of static gold. Then may'st thou out therewith, and fit it in That extreme sphere Whose boundless farness makes it infinitely near.

-- Aleister Crowley

#aleister crowley #poems #poetry #art #culture #dark academia

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imagineclaireandjamie · 5 years ago

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Her Royal Highness (H.R.H.), Part XXV (The Ring)

Her Royal Highness (H.R.H.) Part XXV: The Ring

Time slowed in the cabin.

That was Jamie’s conclusion.

Each touch was a lifetime. The sunrises took longer, seemed more impactful. The banalities of a life – their life – existed for study (after she had carefully captured all aimlessly-wandering droplets off the whipped curves of her body, Claire was fastidious about folding her bath towel – halved lengthwise first, folded carefully over the curtain rod). His heartbeat marked time like an obedient soldier as her hand became a tool to mark him (pushing his knee to the side), to ready herself for a kiss (sweeping curls aside along a jagged deep side part), to ground her already-steady digits (resting above his heart as she lowered her mouth to his throat with a whispered “I will never tire of you”).

With each moment hanging like a ripe, ready-to-pick fruit on a too-thin branch, it was a strange sensation – to have each moment so meaningful and memorable, each revolution of the earth feeling like it took time as day-after-day fell away rapidly. It was as if the history between them – as new as it was – made each second swell until bulbous and fertile with memories, until it was tangible.

At the dawning of their first full day alone and together, Fraser settled into a chair on the front patio, making a space for his truest love – a queen, a woman, just Claire – on his flannel pajama pants-clad lap.

“Come here,” he said, quite unnecessarily as she was already approaching.

Claire plodded towards him in stocking feet, tipping her head to the side in a show of coquettishness so blatant that it made his belly stir. She hadn’t bothered with pants on the morning after her televised mea culpa – just knickers and an old chunky knit jumper she found at the back of his closet (sitting at the end of the bed as she asked for help that morning, he had rolled the impossibly-long sleeves and kissed the backs of her hands, her palms, ten fingertips, the pulse in each wrist). The crown of her head (where a literal crown frequently perched among tamed tresses, awaiting his fingers to free it) was a riotous tumble of curls. And the lazy, first fingers of morning light had painted that crown golden in a more brilliant display than any precious metal that ever rested there.

Neither had spoken much that morning, just letting blissful sighs and honeyed smiles stand in for all the words. Nothing was left to say for the moment. As she lowered herself to his lap, he felt as though the sun had come out on a rainy day.

Just seeing her, knowing that she was his.

A dhia.

Perhaps someday he would tell her that – how in this moment on the porch, he had been irrevocably, painfully in love with everything she was, ever had been, was destined to become. That she had his name, his family. The protection of his body. That as long as he lived, no one could take this from them.

Just a hair’s breadth from him, the swollen pout of her mouth was as good as a recording of the previous night. How he had thoroughly debauched her mouth with his own – tasting her, sucking her lower lip, swallowing her every sound, and feeding her his own.

Her golden head fell forward, her hand tangled in the curls at the nape of his neck, and she kissed him.

“You are a fool for loving me, James Fraser,” she mumbled against his mouth. She tasted of coffee and marmalade, each of the small hairs along the slope of her exposed neck rising as he kissed one bared clavicle reverently. “But you love me, and love me well. Your life will change forever.”

He had only one thing left to say: “Too late.”

That night, as the sun was setting with the same lazy, quicksand sink as the meandering, overweight lift of the sunrise, she rode him furiously, one hand curled around his shoulder and one flat against the side of the cabin. His hand crept beneath the sweater, pushed the fabric up and bunched it on her shoulder, lowered his mouth to the peak of her breast as he bucked up against her. He was desperate to bury himself in her, almost as if he wanted to crawl inside of her (something his sister had said years ago, that a man when making love wants to return to the womb – he had ached with laughing at her, now knew precisely her meaning). Claire cried out, losing rhythm, falling forward and spilling profanity against his unshaven throat.

After they were spent, he whispered, “Your life will change forever.”

It took a moment before she whispered, “It already has.”

Days later – they had a routine. A series of sunrises and sunsets in which they made love and ate breakfast foods. A palpably awkward afternoon where they sat on the front room’s couch like nervous teenagers as the imposing matriarch of the Murray family interrogated them about the whole thing (Claire confessing afterwards that she had never, ever felt less like Queen than when asked by Janet Murray what her intentions were with Jamie). Over forgotten chapter books, they talked about futures and pasts and moments that might be or could have been. They vowed not to break one another’s heart.

And then it was time.

Five sunrises and sunsets later, they were set to return to Balmoral.

They readied themselves next to one another in a charged silence. One where the platitude that things would change had finally taken on a meaning, where the promise of their new life was palpable.

Fraser shaved. Claire put on her earrings for the first time since he had removed them for her on that first night, manufactured a smile as she swept blush onto the apples of her cheeks, traced the cupid’s bow of her mouth with nude lip pencil (one they had tested and found to be remarkably resilient to a kiss, provided no tongues were involved), and straightened the waistband of her smart skirt suit.

“Ye forgot something.” He held out a fist, opened his fingers. The ring sat on his palm – heavy, diamonds glittering and onyx glowing. With a blushing ferocity, she took her ring, uncharacteristically mumbly as she thanked him, asked him never to remind her of what had happened again, and slipped the heavy bauble onto her slim finger. “Do ye ken the meaning of onyx?”

She looked down at the ring, her fingers stiff as she inspected the stone. “What does onyx mean, Fraser?”

He slipped behind her, arms coming to rest around her waist. “It transforms negative energy. It’s a hopeful stone. It helps one walk through life as the master of her own future.”

In the mirror, he could see that her lower lip trembled a little. Her eyes narrowed, wet along the lower lash line as she asked, “Is that true?”

“Aye, through the stone, ye can draw strength to lead the life ye want.” Humming, she kissed the corner of his mouth. “Do ye ken the meaning of a pearl, a nighean?”

“Well, Cleopatra dissolved a pearl in vinegar and drank it to make a point – that she could rule an entire empire,” Claire teased, her voice wavering a little. “But the meaning? I will venture a guess that you are about to tell me, Fraser.”

“And ye’d be right, Claire.” Her name became a tease on his tongue. It was light, sexy. It made her glow. It made her question their decision to go to Balmoral and the assumption they had made all along that they had to do anything. “A pearl is for beauty, of course, but a pearl… weel, it means new beginnings.”

He reached around her, opening his hand once more. On his palm was a simple, single strand of pearls. Somewhat irregularly shaped and interrupted by tiny golden seeded beads, they were no less beautiful than any strand she had in her collection.

“I canna give ye anything as fine as what ye already have. I ken the life that I will lead, that I willna ever be able to provide for ye, to surprise ye wi’ a bit of jewelry. But what I do have… are these.”

He heard her swallow, felt her back melt fully into his front, felt the shift of her ribs as she took a deep breath and then another.

“They’re Scotch pearls. Belonged to my mother. And now they belong to you, mo nighean donn. They’re one of the few things I have left of her. Verra precious to me. As are you, Claire.”

He kissed the top of her shoulder, her ear, and carefully fastened the necklace around her neck, fingers straying at a single errant curl along her nape. Fingers resting on the strand, her eyes met his in the mirror as she whispered, “They are beautiful.”

“Ye probably have a dozen finer–”

Turning, she shook her head and gave him a dire look, her finger pressing over his lips. “Never say that. Ever. I have a collection of all sorts of riches – diamonds, sapphires, emeralds, gold and silver, and yes… pearls too – but nothing will ever live in my heart like these do.”

She cupped his cheeks, rose onto the very tips of her toes, and gave him a chaste kiss.

“Now, take me home to Balmoral.”

* the love of @notevenjokingfic, @balfeheughlywed, @smashing-teacups, and @desperationandgin has kept me going through this story, and I owe them each a good night out on the town. <3

#;mod kate #Her Royal Highness AU #HRH #Part XXV

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artsninspo · 5 years ago

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NerdBae - Part IV

It was impossible not to feel the electricity budding between them. It was everywhere and everyone could feel it just as much as Tre and Elle did. She’d had a little too much to drink after the banquet and got a little too drunk. Tripped on the steps and into Tre’s arms like in the movies, all the wide eyed passion between them only for the impending kiss to be interrupted by Gina opening the front door. Then a week of meetings and R&D for Tre that had been planned for months.

“Y’all need anything?” He asks finding Elle and Gina in the movie room giggling after midnight.

“Ice cream, the one we just bought and chips” Gina fans making Tre chuckle.

“Please” Elle reminds her demanding friend.

“I got you” Tre nods getting the snacks happy to see them comfortable in his home theatre. He hands them their requests before Gina gets up.

“Gonna go call my boo”

“Gi!”

“This shit is boring and Tre will enjoy it more” Gina says leaving with her snacks only to be ice grilled.

“He’s a better cuddler anyways” Elle shouts throwing a pillow playfully. She opens her pint of ice cream stopping herself from taking a spoonful and offering it to Tre.

“Want some?”

“You good” he refuses.

“Too much sugar or something”

“Yes and sugar isn’t good for any part of our bodies, especially highly refined and processed” he begins making Elle smile. She could see the wear of him from the stressful week taking the spare eye mask from the vacant chair beside her.

“We’ll invent something to save me from my sweet tooth” Elle mutters eating the spoonful anyways. It was her response to anything. She opens the package placing the jelly like substance under his eyes.

“I’ll give you all the sugar you need” Tre smiles grabbing her and smothering her with kisses while tickling her mercilessly. He’d missed her a lot.

“Thank you, as much as I appreciate that affection attack this is still my shit, taste it. Then sit still this is good for your eyes” Elle hands him the spoon and he understands the minute it melts on his tongue.

“Wow”

“Uh-huh” she responds as he continues having some. It takes her no time to smooth the patches onto his under eye area. “See this is how you need to be around the competition, confident and yourself. Relaxed” Elle adds.

“Business gets to me because it’s how I provide. All I’ve ever wanted to do was take care of you guys”

“And who takes care of you?”

“All of you do, except Gina but I’ll give her a pass cause she loves me”

“Does she?” Elle teases with a raised brow. “I’m joking, she’s always singing your praises. We both are and we love you Tre. Even if you couldn’t provide” Elle admits. He’d grown up with a chip so big he wanted to be what they all needed in exchange for all the love he got as a kid. All the laughs, adventures, whoppings.

Her phone rings from a blocked number and she ends it immediately.

“Cameron?”

“It’s likely but I’m done. Haven’t been this happy in a long time to be honest, had to learn the hard way I guess. Thanks for inviting us all here and being you” elles words are sincere. He wants to kiss her lips. She was never this sweet with other men, not even Cameron when they were together. He’d seen them together a few times - she wasn’t under him, cuddly or so soft spoken.

“Happiest I’ve been in a long time too Ellie. I’m happy you’re back. I’m here for everything always” he repeats earnestly.

“So right now you’re going to cuddle me and watch this movie and tell me it’s amazing” Elle says getting comfortable and rewinding the parts they missed. She falls asleep in his arms before it’s over and he carries her to her room ticking her in and kissing Elles cheek wanting to get in bed beside her.

“You gonna be okay sleeping in here alone?” He asks.

“Yes?” Elle smiles making a face of uncertainty.

“Come on”

“Lines are a bit blurry - so I better just stay in my room” Elle blushes getting her phone. “You make me nervous when you look at me like that” Elle admits feeling the weight of his gaze on her and liking every bit of how it feels.

“Cant help it” he shrugs openly. “And I know how it goes until you’re comfortable in a space you don’t sleep then get groggy. Come on” he takes her hand gently walking her to her room.

_________

Tre helps Gina stretch - she’s one a mission to get thick. Somehow their mommas genes skipped Gina and she was tall and thin for the most part. They head to a juice shop she he gets her his special.

“Tre, this is amazing”

“Told you” he smiles as they sit down watching the waves crash on the coast. “It’s paradise here, I don’t want to leave”

“Y’all don’t have to” Tre responds honestly. “The house is big enough for all of us. I can move mommas to the pool house and they can have their own areas, whatever makes y’all happy” he shrugs. Gina rests her head on his shoulder.

“How about when I get a boyfriend or Elle and we bring guys home?”Gina smiles feeling his tense knowing she’s hit all the right buttons. “You think you’re slick T but I caught all the looks, you were buzzing”

“You didn’t tell me that she got locked up” he comments.

“We already know I have - she wanted her privacy” Gina defends. She’d spent a night in jail on her twenty first for being plastered.

“That’s not Elle, if she acted out she was hurting”

“Yeah well she was. She broke dishes pulled down curtains rods and all, threw a paper weight breaking a window took an knife to his canvases. Cam kept telling her to stop then she threw a crystal at him and knocked him out for a few minutes. She did cpr and called 911 they came cuffed her up. Cam woke up demanding them to let her go saying it was a lovers squabble or whatever the fuck. She wouldn’t even let him bail her out”

“So is it over for good?”

“Yes! Elles ashamed he got her to that place. I saw the place when I went to get her things. It looked like a natural disaster hit. She was screaming this is art too then and fuck your art.” Gina laughs. “God, I wish I could have seen it live. Stirred the assholes loins, he writes her letters now. Saying bullshit like her passion showed him he made the wrong choice and he’s been painting her but she’s pissed” Gina explains laughing. “I was proud of her”

“She doesn’t need that”

“So she needs you?” Gina questions.

“Yes”

“It’s about time your balls dropped” Gina laughs at her brother.

“What’s so funny G”

“Nothing, you were her first crush, she’s always sweet to you. I’m pretty sure she’s crushing still. All Jo was talking about the other night was how good the two of you looked together. Which means you have my blessing, her moms and we both know Ma adores Ellie” Gina explains making Tre smile.

What’s not to love? He thinks to himself. She’d been the sweetest girl ever. She was always sharing and helping however she could. Even when Gina terrorized him she’d give him a hug. It’s never been her character to cause tension or lash out.

“It’s Elle, if we don’t work out the family is broken” Tre explains with a logical reason against his possible happiness.

“When did you fail at getting something to work. If she’s not feeling you then that’s that. But even if she is, Elle won’t make the first move.”

“Why are you being nice”

“My title for your personal enterprise is consultant. I figure I might as well contribute to my salary every so often. Who knows you strike gold and I might get a raise” Gina winks.

Authors Note: Thanks for reading everyone! How are we feeling about the two main characters? And Gina’s work to get them together? And the actions that landed Elle in jail for a night? Comment your feedback, xx.

TAGS:

@bugngiz @lifelover4u @l-auteuse @notsomellowmushroom @princessasaani @heavensangelxo @bakarilennox

@tastingmellow @chaneajoyyy @thehomierobbstark @jad3djay @thickemadame @doublesidedscoobysnacks @aanairb @hooliemooliedonutshawp

@quietstorm-73 @thememoireeofme @tip222u @amelatonin @cherrystainedlipsbaby @keiva1000 @highlifeflylife

@queenflaws @uzumaki-rebellion @cutewylie @twistedcharismaaa @xo-goldengirl @lostennyc @xo-goldengirl

#nerdbae #Trevante Rhodes #masterlist #trevante rhodes x reader #trevanterhodesimagine #trevante x black reader #trevante

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morelikesin · 5 years ago

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Warmth and Bruises

A self-indulgent take on the Forbidden Hospital Scene, where Phoenix's fall from the burning bridge is much more realistic, plus my take on what went down during Miles' visit to Phoenix afterwards. All art shown during the work is also mine 💕💕

Readers' Discretion; this starts off with gore due to Phoenix's POV right after he fell.

With that, the rest is under cut!!

The flash of darkness consumed Phoenix for an unknown duration of time - horror holding him in its maw during the entirety of his fall, and then some. It was so painful, how he landed - he felt as if he'd gotten punched in the stomach repeatedly. The back of his head pulsated, every pulse sending a wave of deep ache throughout his body; he knew he must have landed on the rocks rather than in the water, for the rapid, cold rush only grazed his fingertips even with his arms outstretched.

Breathing heavily through his nose, which smelled of iron, he brought his arms closer to try and lift himself up with his elbows - failing miserably as he writhed with every passing, agonizing moment of movement. Every move he so desperately tried to make was quickly extinguished of its hope of working. He felt dizzy. So, so dizzy.

The last thing he remembered seeing prior to this was Larry reaching out to him, trying to save him from his fall; the man's face contorted into sheer fear, sheer despair as he realized he wouldn't be able to save him. As Phoenix's eyes met with the burning bridge high above him, he hoped Larry knew it wasn't his fault he was down here. He hoped he'd get to tell him that.

And suddenly, he choked. Gasping in shock, it sent more of whatever he was suffocating on down his throat the wrong way. He coughed, he wheezed, he gargled until he felt his breath return like normal and the warmth of the cause spilling from his lips and down the side of his face. Heterochromatic eyes widened as he tasted what he'd smelled earlier. A rustic iron.

Ever so slowly bringing one of his hands to his face, nerves in his limbs nearly shot, he touched his cheek to collect the substance he nearly died on and examined his fingertips. The light of the fire above him was enough to prove it was blood. That couldn't be. He wasn't wounded internally, so he couldn't have been bringing up blood, right?

The smell in his nose said otherwise. The painful ringing in his ears said otherwise. The fear of testing to see if any fluid drained from said ears was enough to make him not check at all. The back of his head he knew to have been injured, feeling the rock's blunt surface pressing into it. And yet even with being alive at all, something was still wrong.

His abdomen was sore; Phoenix trying not to focus on it so he could have some sort of mercy. He assumed his back must have taken its own heavy blow as well. He would have left it at that as he tried to get up once more, had it not been for the dull pangs that emitted from the area as he leaned up in the slightest. He planned to look down to try and recuperate, only for a moment. It took that moment for his eyes to meet the rod that jutted from the midst of his waist - sticking out about a ruler long, coated in flecks of innards and dark red blood. His clothes around the area were soaked much the same, dreadfully taken notice of due to a visible bulb of his intestine that was pushed out alongside the rebar.

His lips trembled. He swore he couldn't see for a second or two - vision coming and going as his head swam with nausea, with numbness, with such a profound terror of unknowing what to do, what will *happen* to him. His heart pounded in his ears like the loudest drums he'd ever heard, and his skin went cold.

And so he gripped the metal bar with both of his hands, loathing how warm it felt against his hold, and tried to hoist himself up from his lying position once more.

Mercy was deaf. The initial throbbing ache was traded for pure torment as he bent his torso - his vision going white for a solid few moments in its wake. Grunting and whimpering in distress, knuckles white, a sweat forming on his face, he couldn't find it in him to sob as he so irretrievably wanted to. Whatever tears spilled from his eyes were involuntary; they wouldn't have been noticed at all if it weren't for how they made everything look blurred. He gagged, he quivered, before suddenly everything went black again.

February 8, 10:35 AM

General Hospital

The halls were much too bright for his liking. Raising a svelte hand, he brushed back his long gray bangs as they threatened to look less than meticulate.

"I'm here to see Phoenix Wright."

The receptionist seemed to look through a few files on her computer before looking back up with a nod. "Room Two-Eighty-Seven, MICU."

Miles gave a polite nod as he turned away from the desk and prepared to travel through the halls; eyes narrowed and fighting watery-vision due to how blinding the tile was. Or maybe it was because he felt the need to cry. He couldn't really tell - both were true.

This wasn't true, right? Maybe Larry was seeing things. Maybe someone else was called Phoenix Wright. Right?

Yet as he made his way to the ICU Wing, and walked into the room, his eyes gave him his answer; sat up in a hospital bed, head tilted down and arms at his sides with numerous tubes inserted into his hands and wrists, was the man he felt so deeply for. Phoenix looked, as hurt as he was to admit, horrible from a distance. Hair disheveled, mannerisms taught and stiff...

Miles found himself walking up to the bed before he registered that he was doing so - a little hesitant with his greeting, "..Hello, Wright."

The recovering man seemed zoned out before noticing his visitor, his head raising up to meet Miles' silver gaze. Those heterochromatic eyes of his still held that special glimmer the prosecutor came to adore - the sight giving him a taste of peace despite the nasal canula that made Phoenix obviously uncomfortable, nose scrunching up occasionally. "Miles..? You...came to see me?"

"Of course I came to see you," Miles spoke gently, a coarse contrast to Phoenix's pained voice. "You had me terrified."

"I'm sorry."

Miles paused to think over that. He's sorry? There was nothing to be sorry for. Phoenix, "..Why?"

The tinge of hurt in Miles' tone wrenched Phoenix's heart a bit. His gaze fell as they rest upon the IV in his hand - going to sit up more before he winced at the pain in his abdomen and opted to lie still. The wince caused the prosecutor's expression to fall in worry before Phoenix finally came to reply; his voice being subtly rough. "..For scaring you. I-I don't want to distract you from your work just because I was.. careless. I mean, I don't think you were as scared as I was, but.. but I still feel bad for it." The defense laughed at his attempt for humour - disappointed to be met with a frowning sigh from Edgeworth. Of course Wright would joke at a time like this.

"Well, please don't. You're my priority." He gave the man a glimpse of softness, met with said man looking touched. "How are you feeling?"

Phoenix smiled to try and ease Edgeworth's painfully obvious frantic worry. "It hurts to lean, but.. otherwise alright. Just.. sore."

Miles had heard some of the story of Phoenix's fall from Larry, who had visited the man earlier this morning, yet some details were only known to the defense himself. Scratching that inquisitive itch of his, he begged a few questions.

"What, ah.. all are you recovering from?"

Phoenix's eyes lowered, recalling what he remembered in those brief minutes before he passed out, and what the doctors had told him upon his regain of consciousness. Finding what he needed to say, his gaze came back up. "I...landed on rebar - stuck out straight through me. They said it didn't sever anything in my spine, but it's a miracle that it didn't. I'm told I'm.. lucky, considering what happened."

Miles bit his lip and felt that watery threshold threaten the corners of his eyes. He blinked them back before Wright could notice. "I..I'm so sorry, Phoenix. I heard it was bad, but.."

"It's alright. You don't have to be sorry for me - just.. thank you for being here."

The two exchanged a tender smile before Miles' fell to keep questioning; torn to do so, but he wanted to know all he could. "I heard you also received head trauma?"

Phoenix grimaced as he slouched a bit. "Some, but I'm not surprised about that. When I landed, the back of my head hurt like crazy. I have some bruising and scrapes, but-"

"I'm sorry, what was that?"

"What was what?"

"What you just said."

Phoenix shrugged and cocked a brow slightly, "I have bruising? I would have to expect that, though."

Miles blinked in confusion, tripping over his words. "N..No, I.. Before that, about your head?" He swore he didn't hear that right.

"Oh-! When I landed, I had a god awful headache. It feels better than it did," Phoenix tried to humour Miles again, unsurprisingly to no avail. "-but it still hurts here and there."

"You were awake for that..?"

"I..I mean, not for long."

"Not for long-?!" Miles' voice came less calm than he wanted - the obvious distress soaked in his words, "I-"

"It's fine, Miles."

"It's not damn fine-!"

"Miles." Phoenix leaned up to take his companion's hand into his to help comfort him, disregarding the pain that came with bending his torso for the time being, even if it caused his voice to become a little strained. "I'm fine. It's- It's fine, I'm here now. I'm alive, it's fine-"

Phoenix cut himself off with a hitched breath and a wheeze before Miles quickly came a bit closer so the man could sit back again. The few moments it took for him to regain a steady breath left the quiet in the room to become tense.

Phoenix's voice came nearly inaudible. "..I'm.. sorry."

"Please.. stop saying that."

Phoenix shook his head, still clutching the prosecutor's hand as he tilted his head back up to share a desperate stare. "You have.. so many other things to.. to be doing right now. And, I'm sorry I dragged you out here-"

"You didn't drag-"

"Then why did you come?"

Miles wasn't sure he was ready to admit the truth yet. He couldn't. He didn't want to lose the person he had finally reconciled with after so long - he didn't want to lose him because of stupid, unnecessary feelings. "...I wanted to."

"Why? Larry might've told you, but- gh-" Another breather, "...But.. you.. didn't have to come. I-I'm glad you did, but-"

Miles pushed Phoenix's hand out of his own, turning his head away stiffly. Phoenix hushed his own breath. The silence that purged the room was sickening. With how long it lasted, Phoenix was convinced he had drove Miles away, to his own heartbreak - seemingly driving him away when he'd never wanted more in the past than now to just hold him and-

"...I've felt a closeness to you for years." Miles suddenly began, "Even in the time we held a void between us in our younger selves, and especially these past few years, I've felt.. content, with you. With the idea of you." He stopped himself to bite his lip - trying to successfully find the words for this, without saying too much. Lowering his body into the chair that was close to the side of the bed, his hands fidgeted in his lap - a usual nervous tick for him. "Even with all of my studies, you're more important. I'd never say anything else is more important to me than you and your safety. So, yes.. I came because I wanted to. I needed to."

When Miles came to look back up to Phoenix, he was disheartened to find him in tears. Before he could get any fumbled words past his lips, Phoenix shook his head and raised a weakened hand to try and clean his face, "..I-I thought I was a burden to you-"

Miles reached out to take Phoenix's hand as they so held just a bit ago. "You could never burden me, Phoenix Wright."

Miles sucked in a shaky breath before his thumb comfortingly rubbed against the back of his companion's hand, careful to not brush against the painted bruise on his knuckles. He was similarly praised as Phoenix took his other hand to place on top of Miles'; faces looking into one another’s with a sort of passion that was engulfing to both parties.

Miles slowly and reluctantly removed himself from their hand-embrace so he could shift the chair a bit closer and lean his waist on the side of the bed; his hands taking hold of Phoenix's cheeks as blushed thumbs wiped away his earlier tears. He was surprised to feel Phoenix's hands gently wrap around his wrists - and for a moment, the two of them held their breaths. For a moment, Phoenix studied silver, sharp eyes while Miles studied the contrasting russet brown and sapphire blue. For a moment, they noticed how perfectly the other's hair framed their perfect face. Phoenix found his hands taking hold of the red scarf around Miles' neck.

And, somehow, when they came forward into one another to kiss, it felt.. comfortable. The pining for one another slinked into the back of their minds as if it hadn't existed at all. For as long as it lasted, they drank in each other's taste, each other's warmth with feverish intent - the kiss starting as a heat of the moment mash of lips before it transpired into something deeper, more vehement, with the parting of their lips to messily meet at their tongues. It was uncertain, and unrefined, but fervid. It was perfect to them.

Miles had pulled away first, once tightened hands relaxing a bit as he caught his breath, face angled down and eyes kept shut. Phoenix moved his hands down to clutch the collar of Miles' coat - lip bitten and swallowing back a mixture of their salivas. It took a bit before they addressed what had just happened.

"...Is that why you came to visit me?"

Phoenix's comment earned him a sideways glare from Edgeworth, to which he laughed and raised one of his hands to caress the prosecutor's cheek again.

"..No. However, I.. have wanted to.. do that, for a... a while." Miles' unfamiliarity with this was showing, but frankly the feeling was mutual. The undefined way of what to do next unsettled the both of them equally.

"..You and me both."

Meeting at their eyes again, they held stern and furrowed expressions before relaxing and simply letting it be. They came close again as they held one another, foreheads pressed and eyes shut to bathe in each other's company. The quiet felt comfortable. The uncertainty merely a small obstacle.

With breathlessness hanging onto his words, Miles came to nervously ask "What does.. this mean, then?"

The defense broke into another smile. Swallowing back whatever anxiety ate at him currently, he sprouted his speech in hope. "I...guess...whatever we want it to mean. I-I..I want this to be more."

And with the statement spoken into the Universe, the two were guaranteed to have been thinking the same thing; 'Yes'. Even unsure of where this would take them, they wanted to try. They'd wanted this for so long - and by Gods, they wanted to try. Somehow the thought of the acclaimed Chief Prosecutor being bonded with the Miracle Defense Attorney also had an incredible ring to it.

"..Please recover, Phoenix."

"I will. Thank you for being here, Miles."

"I wouldn't want to be anywhere else."

#ace attorney #aa #narumitsu #wrightworth #phoenix wright #miles edgeworth #naruhodo ryuichi #mitsurugi reiji #ace attorney trials and tribulations #gore #my work #my writing #my art #don't steal #original #morelikesin #traditional art #finished #au

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earthlyambition · 5 years ago

Photo

The intentions with this post have been circling in my brain for days. But now that i'm actually getting the chance to write, i feel at a loss for words.

My need for activism surrounding animals has been at full force lately. I have seen all of the debates, watched all the documentaries, and read all the books regarding the injustice and specism around non human animals. I finally felt ready to take my activism into my own hands, and visited my first dairy farm. With this being said, I had never announced that I was an animal rights activist. None of the employees or other guests on the farm knew my intentions. And to be quite honest, neither did i. I knew that i was going to do whatever i could to keep my cool to bear witness to these beautiful animals. But what i didn't know, was how my emotions were going to play a part in that. I have always been a pretty emotional being, and i was trying my hardest to not let that get the best of me and cause a scene. I knew that nobody there would listen to the extent i was wanting, so in a sense i felt hopeless. I did learn something while on this farm. I learned that even the most “humane” farm has awful brutal conditions for these animals.

This farm was an hour away. I went alone, which meant on the drive down, I had plenty of time to mentally prepare for what I was going to witness. I had this thought in the back of my mind that for some reason, “maybe it won't be as bad as i think it's going to be”. After all, the milk bottles always seem to talk about “ happy cows” and cartoonized them into “loving to provide” for human consumption.

Arriving at the farm, I instantly felt my nerves take over. I walked in with a shaky voice into the lobby, and waited to be taken to the “ milking room” by the farmer on site. My group and I walked down a long narrow hallway that soon was greeted by an overwhelming smell of rotten food, feces and manure. Once we made it to the milking room, i was shocked. I couldn't believe that this small room was used to milk over 400 cows, daily. They had several cows crowded and crammed into this room. The cows tried to back away any chance they could get, but couldn't because they were so confined in between metal rods and surrounded by other cows. There was one cow in particular that caught my eye. She had her head rested on a bar that held her close by. She looked exhausted, from being constantly bred and milked her whole life. This broke me. Every wall I had built up leading to this moment brought me back to square one. I felt vulnerable and to be honest, quite embarrassed. But more than anything, i was angry. Angry that everyone around me saw this as normal. I felt like the only one in the room that saw the situation from the victims perspective. I tried to reason with the rest of the group and see it as a necessity, but its too hard to look at it that way when there are so many alternatives that don't cause suffering. I quickly calmed down and realized I was here for the animals, and my motivation shot back up.

After the milking room, we were taken next to the line of cows leading up to the milkroom. We were told that there would be baby calves for us to “pet” and for anyone to get the chance to “milk a cow” for the first time. It broke my heart to watch this sweet mama be touched and pulled at by random strangers, while her baby sat across the room pinned up. Her baby had been taken hours after he was born, and would soon be sent to slaughter, because he wasn't born for the means to be milked someday.

I spoke with many employees that day. I asked questions, made comments, and expressed my concerns regarding the wellbeing of these animals. I forced them to answer questions regarding artificial insemination, slaughterhouse send offs, and touchy subjects about the whole process of taking the babies from their mom. These workers seemed happy to do their job. It seemed so normal to them, that when someone asked these questions, it took them by surprise. I asked an employee if he ever felt upset or saddened when the cows were sent off to slaughter and he shrugged and said “well, when they stop producing enough milk, there isn't much we can do”.

The owner of the company shared that he can “get the cows to do whatever he wants them to do”. Despite the “happy cow” persona, these cows were being held and forced against their will, and I can assure you that they were not happy during the process.

While they offered cheese and milk samples, I snuck off of the tracks of the tour and went behind the farm. I saw hundreds of day/week/month old baby calves, locked up in what seemed to be small dog houses. Every single one was trying to run and jump in the small space they were “provided”. I couldn't help but cry to these babies. The world let them down. They needed their mother. But, the dairy industry took their mothers from them, for societies cereal and coffee. Before long they will be put into this industry for about 3 years until they are sent to be slaughtered.

This experience was a start to a long journey for me. I am learning more and more every day about how to help educate those around me, and how to better myself. Being an empath and a vegan has been a very narrow road for me. I often become angry, and sad simply because its difficult to have such a small voice in a big world. I often wish it was easier to reveal these industries to those i care about, but everyone having their own choice plays too large of a role for me to intervene. If there's anything i've learned at the beginning of this journey, it is to be gentle with myself. It can sometimes be hard to come to the conclusion that I live in a not yet vegan world. I have learned to listen more intently. and sometimes, it may seem as though someone is being ignorant, but their views just differ from mine. Ive learned patience and so much perseverance in this process and how passion is beautiful.

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bts5sosempire · 5 years ago

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Yandere! BTS Reaction: Trap & Bound

A/n: *risen from the dead* I-I'm...alive!

Pairing: Yandere! Bts x Reader

Words: 1,663

Content: Slight mention of abuse, toxic relationship, horror/ thriller, delusional, force relationship, drugs, manipulation, etc.

Prompt: “Take care of me will you?”

Kim Seokjin:

Sitting in front of your vanity mirror with such a petrified look as you do your best to calm down and try not to breakdown. Jin was behind you, combing your luscious locks as he glides a comb down smoothly to tame the messy tresses. Never would you have thought this person was capable of being a monster.

Jin was everything a person would've wanted in their life before everything went downhill. He was charismatic, so funny with his lame puns and jokes, and to the point your parents liked him.

Hell, the reason why you're sitting in front of a vanity and being decorated like a bride for a wedding…that is was is happening now.

“You look so pretty,” he complimented before leaning down next to your face and smiles at you in the mirror. It would've sounded nice but the fact that you can see your parents mangled bodies behind you through the reflection is very off-putting. Clenching your hands together into fists, Jin chuckles, “Since you're gonna be a Kim alongside with me,” he then utter those words that cause dread to set within you.

Min Yoongi:

Breathing deeply as you feel another convulsion of a shock going through you again. You shaking hands grips the knife tightly in your hands.

Silently sobbing into the dark, you can't prevent any sounds coming out from your throat as the images of people who were precious to you like jewels lay dead in their own pool of blood.

“What do you want from me Yoongi?!” You scream angrily into the dark narrow hallway that was almost deprived of any light but was saved but a lone candle that seems to be walking closer to you in the hands of someone.

“What do I want from you?” Yoongi mocks your question rhetorically before a slight laugh and scoff came from them. “That's a good question,” he brings the candle closer to his face to show there was blood splatter across as it glint by the light. “Since you've made me so crazy for you and you're all I ever see in my head,” he stalks closer to your face and held the candle closer to you both, and whisper those words to you so soft and dangerous.

The candle then was blown out as a scream echo out.

Jung Hoseok:

Faintly tracing the marred scars on your collarbone you look at your haggard self in the mirror. Dried blood smear on your lips due to being abused. Tired eyes from the lack of sleep. Bruises of handprints litter on your body due to being mistreated.

The sound of the door being knock open at the front brought you back from reality. Quickly putting your clothes—that was given by Hoseok, you open the bathroom door and fear overtook your body. Your heart was hammering loudly in your ears and it feels like it wants to bust out from your chest.

“(Name)!” Hoseok shouted in the house. He sounded angry by the tone and use of your name.

Slowly approaching the man, he throws a knife pass your head that implanted deeply on a dartboard and you stop walking immediately and close your eyes in fright.

“What took you so long? Also, did I tell you to stop walking?” His eyes dangerously narrow at you and you shook your head as a ‘no’ to appease him. Continue towards him, his mood shifted immediately to a happy one you recognize during the first few months of dating him. “Come here,” he opens his lap for you while extending a hand out at you.

Slowly accepting his hold, he pulls you into his lap and you tense up. It's not like he cares anyway. “Since I have been so nice to you for so long, why don't you…” He whispers out while one of his hands glides underneath your shirt.

Kim Namjoon:

Hands clutching onto a much stronger one as the feeling of life is being depleted from you every second. Water spills everywhere from the bathtub from the frantic kicking and erratic movements.

Namjoon pulls you out of the tub of ice cold water and you gasp out for air. He tosses the glasses he was wearing somewhere in the bathroom as his white dress shirt was drench in water, which shows his chest and his stomach.

You were coughing and shivering in the bathtub. You were also sure that your lips were purple too.

“I've been patient (Name), and you're just taking advantage of it.” He was calm, and you can see he was disappointed in you. “I also expect much better behavior from you from now on.” Namjoon took off his tie and start to unbuttoned his wet see-through shirt. “Get out of the bath and drain the water, draw me a warmer one.” He then proceeds to pull you up from the bathtub by the arm. One of his arms snake around your waist that spare no personal space.

Namjoon then whispers those words slow and seductive, which cause you to squirm in his hold.

Park Jimin:

You never thought something so innocent and pure would destroy your world overnight like this. Sitting in front of you was Jimin who happily talk to you minus the mess of dismembering corpses blood and bodies were everywhere in the room.

“Noona did you listen to me?” The man pouted and shook you slightly. Snapping back to reality, you stutter out a few incoherent words in fear. Seeing you try to answer him he just giggles at you. He thought it was cute how you were so afraid of him, “It's okay,” one of his bloodied hand went to your face, “I get that being newlyweds must be kind of shocking.”

“What do you mean newlyweds?” Your question makes the man pout again, and you gulp nervously at what he was about to say.

“I ask if you were okay that today we are married to each other, and you nodded. I even ask the part of wanting children too and you also nodded.”

Oh fuck, you're so screwed.

Jimin then grasp your hands tightly and pull you across the table to him, “You won't lie to me right?” You were so afraid that his eyes darken and you just nodded at what he said. “Great!” He let's go of your hands and clap his hands together, “Let's get started!” What Jimin said next didn't match his cheerful manner, those words that he said only makes you more afraid.

Kim Taehyung:

Nothing seems to register to you, every time you look at the paper the world seems to spin around you. “Dr. Kim,” you childishly called out to Taehyung who was busy giving you a drug through the IV drip that'll keep your mind like a child, “I don't understand this!”

Taehyung snatch the paper from you and scan the paper, “Where do you get this?”

“I got it from outside! Doesn't the girl in the paper look like me?” Proudly telling him, the man hit your face. This made you whimper as you feebly hold your cheek in pain.

“What did I tell about the outside world?”

Cowering under his tone you can't help it but cry. “Y-You told me not to go outside and to never do it.”

“Good that you remember, and yet you still do it,” he then pulls out an electrical rod from a drawer, “but there is punishment for consequences too.”

Your eyes widen and you start to hyperventilating in your chair. “I'm sorry please don't hurt me!”

“You do know how hard it is for me to take care of you don't you? But I can let this slip if you'll be willing to please me.” That somehow made your ears perk up. “If you're willing to take care of me and help me lure the bastard who had handed you that flyer then I can let this go.” There was a smirk from him and a dark glint in your eyes. And without hesitation, you told him, ‘yes’ and that made him happy.

Jeon Jungkook:

Chain to the bed headboard you try to tugged the cuff links just to make sure that there would be a defect in the links.

“What are you doing baby?”

You look at the door to found an amuse Jungkook who cocks a brow at you while leaning against the doorframe. Blowing hair out if your face you just roll your eyes at him and throw your head back into the pillows.

Jungkook heavy boots approach your prison form. The man looms over you. He grabs your jaws and let his thumb caress the bruise underneath before pressing it and this cause you to lash out violently at him in pain. But the cuffs prevent you from doing it so.

“You don't like it when I'm being nice nor mean to you, so you better pick a side and stick to it, baby.” Palming your face with his callous hand be gives a few slaps. You spit at Jungkook and he just chuckles, “Guess mean it is.”

He then presses a finger at the barely close wound on your stomach and you scream in pain as he digs it deeper to open it back up. Sinister as he is, he can replace the devil anytime.

Taking his finger out he then drew a heart on your unbruised side of the face. Blood seeps out from the wound. “I can be nice sometimes, all you had to do is just swallow your pride and submit to me.” He then drums his fingers down your bloodied stomach, “But then again, it's your turn so…”

His sweet voice says such words that sound so vehemently in your mind makes you wish you were dead.

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fallenqueen2 · 5 years ago

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Mainland + Blonds 1 [Macgyver/Hawaii 5-O]

Mainland + Blond’s

Danny really has good reason to hate the Mainland now and Mac decides that being blond is overrated.

Prompt: Cages

MacGyver/Hawaii 5-O crossover

Part 12 of Love + Angst

Ao3 Link

Chapter 1 [Danny & Mac]

Mac felt like someone had taken a jackhammer to his forehead. He moaned weakly as he pried his sore eyes open before instantly closing them at the sudden brightness.

“Easy buddy, take it slow.” A male voice coached and Mac found himself following the advice and soon the world didn’t seem so bright and everything swam into focus. That’s when Mac realized he was in trouble.

“Don’t try and sit up, it looks like you have a pretty nasty head wound and who knows what they are pumping you full of.” The voice returned and Mac squinted down at his right elbow where he felt a pinching sensation coming from and blinked at the IV line that was coming from his skin.

He lifted his left hand to pull it out but cold metal and a clinking sound made him pause. He looked over at his left wrist to see it was handcuffed to a steel rod, which made no sense to Mac. Mac slowly looked around and groaned; of course, it made sense if he was inside of a cage.

“Yeah, that was my reaction,” The voice snorted and Mac slowly turned his head to the left to see an identical cage sitting a few feet away from his. A ruffled blond with slick-backed hair was sitting against the far side of his cage, his dress pants and shirt dirtied with blood and dirt.

“Where are we?” Mac asked, voice raspy and he licked his chapped lips as he slowly levered himself up, the world briefly spinning around him before he blinked rapidly and slumped against the side of his cage breathing heavily.

“No idea, the bastards who grabbed me, kept me unconscious the whole time.” The blond gritted his teeth, looking like he was beating himself up over it.

“Sounds familiar, why am I drugged up and you’re not?” Mac asked as he noted the heavy cast iron shackle that was latched too tight around his right ankle and the matching chain looped around one of the steel rods.

“You injured one of the bastards when they grabbed you, must have freaked them out enough to keep you doped up.” The blond ran his fingers through his hair, smoothing some stray pieces back into place.

“I’m Mac,” Mac offered as he tried to remember what had led up to him being taken, he hated to say it but at least it wasn’t Murdoc this time.

“Danny,” The man gave a brief smile and shifted over to the side of his cage that was closer to Mac’s, a clinking noise made Mac realize Danny was shackled as well.

“Any idea who took us?” Mac asked, suddenly glad he wasn’t alone in this mess and that Danny seemed oddly calm about this whole thing.

“I saw some other cages in another room each time they bring in water and bread, all of them fit blond males… I hate to say it but it looks like human trafficking.” Danny surmised and Mac frowned at the thought.

“I think being blond may be overrated now,” Mac muttered getting a brief laugh from Danny.

“Figures I’d be taken on the mainland, Steve is going to love this,” Danny muttered as he swiped his palms down his pants.

“Mainland?” Mac asked, needing to talk to try and fight back against the drugs that were keeping him feeling heavy and off balance.

“Oh right, I’m from Hawaii well now I am. I just came back to LA for a layover to Jersey to see my family. That was maybe a day ago? Steve is anal about me checking in when I’m traveling so since I haven’t in 24 hours he should be looking and he’ll find us. He isn’t a SEAL for nothing.” Danny explained, looking fond as he spoke about Steve the SEAL and Mac felt suddenly lonely and he hoped Jack realized he was gone.

“SEAL huh? Mine was my Overwatch in the army and he just kind of followed me home, if both of them are looking for us then we should be rescued sometime soon.” Mac said confidently before shutting his eyes and breathing through another dizzy spell.

“Mac, hey, look we aren’t going anywhere in the meantime so try and get some sleep yeah?” Danny advised as he looked at the younger blond in concern.

“Yeah, good plan… Try and get that bolt out of the cage and maybe, maybe you can use it to get your door open… Jack will be here soon…” Mac said drowsily before his eyes slid shut and his head lolled to the side.

Danny took a few breathes to stop himself from freaking out about Mac passing out, it was just the drugs and if they were being held by human traffickers than they wanted them in relatively good shape.

Danny looked at the bolt and shook his head in disbelief, the kid was drugged to the gills but still managed to find the one bolt that wasn’t all but nailed into the cement floor. Danny settled by the bolt and got to work.

It was tedious work and his fingers were a bloodied mess but in the end, Danny had a bolt settled on the palm of his hand and he didn’t feel as useless as he had before. He tugged on the shackle that had been a source of annoyance for a while now and frowned at the lock, it would be impossible without the key and Danny didn’t know how much time they had.

Traffickers didn’t stay in one place too long, especially if people started to hunt them down and Danny had no doubts Steve was doing just that.

Danny could have collapsed in relief when gunshots began to echo around the warehouse, instead of relaxing Danny got into a crouched position and held the bolt up like a weapon and to him it was. Danny bared his teeth as the door was kicked in and an unfamiliar man in black unmarked tactical gear stormed in, his gun still raised. The moment his eyes landed on Mac, unconscious inside of the cage next to Danny, his face melted into one Danny had seen on Steve’s face many times.

“You must be Jack,” Danny said in realization as the man who was followed by the rest of a tactical team swarmed the room, knelt next to Mac’s cage, hands fluttering around the IV.

“Yeah, and you must be Danny Williams. McGarrett has been going nuts with you missing.” Jack nodded at Danny who slumped onto the floor but kept his grip on the bolt.

“Steve, is he here?” Danny asked as a man opened the cage doors with a set of keys they must have gotten off of their kidnappers.

“Yeah, he’s here the crazy man. McGarrett, we found them. South building!” Jack said into his com piece and quickly entered Mac’s cage, unlocking the shackle and cuff, gathering the unconscious blond into his arms protectively.

Danny was being helped out of the cage, his leg feeling ridiculously lighter when Steve and Junior burst into the room, both decked out in their own tactical gear.

“Danno,” Steve breathed out in relief as he shoved his gun into his holster and pulled Danny into a tight hug. Danny clung to the taller man, not realizing he was shaking until he was in Steve’s arms.

“You found me,” Danny said into Steve’s shoulder and blinked back the wetness that was stinging at his eyes.

“Always Danno,” Steve promised fiercely, kissing the blond’s forehead.

“Hey, Jack? Thanks, man,” Steve nodded at his old army friend who had Mac in his arms bridal style.

“No problem brother, we found them,” Jack said as he looked down at Mac with soft eyes before leaving the room and the cages behind.

“He looks at Mac like you look at me, I wonder how long it will take them to get their heads out of their ass’s.” Danny mused as he, Steve and Junior followed Mac and Jack.

“Hopefully not as long as it took us,” Steve said with a smile on his face.

“No kidding, I can’t imagine what it was like before Tani and I joined,” Junior muttered under his breath and laughed when Steve shot him a playful glare.

“Nah even drugged out of his mind, the kid was insistent that his Jack would save us,” Danny commented and Steve just smiled knowingly.

“You should have seen Jack, I thought I was going out of my mind but he was another level,” Steve said just as knowingly. They just exchanged looks when they stepped outside and spotted Jack caressing Mac’s face, as the blond was now awake and strapped to a stretcher, words being traded in soft tones.

“Yeah, they won’t take as long as we did.” Danny decided and leaned into his husband’s side content now that they were all safe.

#MacGyver #hawaii 5-0 #Crossover #Love + Angst #Established Steve McGarrett/Danny Danno Williams #Pre-Mac/Jack #whump #non-con drug use #cages #human trafficking #kidnapp #kidnapped Danny #Kidnapped Mac #Protective Steve Mcgarett #protective Jack Dalton #fallenqueen2

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awashsquid · 5 years ago

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Part 3 of @sittingoverheredreaming‘s commission series! Group post is here, if you want to catch up (which I recommend doing before this chapter!). This part is right around 2400 words. If you like it, thank Sam for commissioning it, reblog, leave a comment - y’all know the drill :) If you’re interested in commissioning me, click on this handy lil link!

Haruka had returned in a matter of minutes after Hotaru’s exit, so quickly that Michiru wondered aloud how they had not ran into each other in the hall, to which Haruka just shrugged. The nurse had acquiesced to lowering Michiru’s pain medications, and she could feel the fog dissipating from her vision. Though this should have been a relief, the intense pain of her wounds healing at accelerated speeds acted as a hot knife, slicing and searing through each agonizing moment. She could taste blood on her bottom lip from biting down to hold in a scream when a particularly bad wave had hit, the coppery aftertaste lingering even after the wound had stopped bleeding.

After a few minutes of Haruka whispering reassurances from beside her, Michiru began to regain enough sense to fill her in on the updates from Hotaru. The act of explaining kept her mind somewhat distracted from the sensation of her bones knitting back together, and Haruka seemed to sense this as she quietly listened, simply nodding when Michiru would pause.

“And thus, here we are,” Michiru concluded, the somehow still perfect manicure on her left hand digging deeply into her palm as she clenched her hand into a fist from the pain. “The handful of us against Serenity, with Mercury at her back besides.” The pain mercifully dulled to an acute throb - impossible to ignore, but more manageable as her body and mind adjusted to its presence. “Will you join us in killing the would-be Queen? Of ensuring that Crystal Tokyo never comes to pass?”

There was barely a pause before Haruka’s answer came, delivered with a small smile. “Michi, you don’t even have to ask. You know I would follow you anywhere, even into Hell.” She punctuated this statement by moving a piece of hair back from where it had stuck to Michiru’s cheek, tucking it gently behind her ear, the touch as soft as a quiet wind.

Relief swelled in Michiru’s chest as the tension in her shoulders sagged. There had not been an argument, as she had assumed there would be, and for this she was immensely grateful; she had not needed to defend the fact that Usagi, too, had died on that battlefield, and an imposter now wore her corpse. She allowed the balm of her lover’s assurances, more effective than any medicine the hospital had to offer, to wash away the twinge of fear that the argument had been too easily won. She almost allowed herself to believe that Haruka’s love for her meant more than her devotion to their Princess, but her brain stopped short of such blatant optimism, the serpent’s voice in the back of her mind whispering that it must be too good to be true, that she needed to ask; she could not remain blissfully ignorant in the Garden when such fruit hung inches from her face.

Michiru smiled, forcing those thoughts down, focusing only on the deep green of Haruka’s eyes as they twinkled, the brightest stars amidst the constellation of freckles on her nose, her lips wishing to explore every inch of the galaxy that her love contained. “I’m glad to hear it. This will be challenging enough with you; I do not wish to imagine without.”

“You’ll never have to,” Haruka replied easily before standing, the bed barely moving with the smoothness of her rising. She leaned overtop of the resting woman and pressed a gentle kiss on the sweat-dampened forehead, and Michiru knew she should be appalled that Haruka was seeing her in such a state, but she couldn’t find it in herself to care about anything more than the lips on her brow.

As she stepped backwards, Michiru’s skin immediately tingling from the memory of those lips, gentle as a ghost, Haruka deftly plucked the call button from where it rested and placed it underneath her right hand. “Now that’s settled, why don’t you call the nurse and ask for more pain meds? You look like you need them.” It wasn’t said unkindly, her lover’s eyes sympathetic and warm, but Michiru still felt the sting of the words, a cold spray of seawater splashed onto her cheek by an aggressive breeze, her cheeks flushing with the impact.

“I - perhaps it is unwise to…” her sentence drifted off as she stared at Haruka’s face, brow quirked and mouth still wearing that gently teasing smile.

“You already got approved to leave tomorrow, right? Why make yourself suffer in the meantime?” The corners of her mouth ticked downward and her voice took on a somber tone, losing the playful lilt of a moment before. “I hate seeing you like this,” Haruka murmured as her eyes darted around Michiru’s body, carving out a path from the bandages on her chest to the IV in her arm, and every bruise and cut in-between. “It’ll be easier if you just take the medicine, Michi.” Haruka’s expression was somewhat forlorn, and Michiru found that if a suitable argument existed to the contrary, she did not know it.

“All right,” Michiru whispered, index finger lightly touching the call button. The smile returned to Haruka’s face and she leaned down to give another feather-light kiss, the sweet temptation of her breath overpowering all traces of blood on her lips.

When Michiru awoke the next morning, eyes squinting with the effort of not simply succumbing back into blissful sleep, her vision cleared around the sight of hawklike eyes, watching her every breath intently. It took another moment for her to realize that it was Haruka’s gaze that met her own. “How are you feeling, Michiru?”

Michiru forced her eyelids to open and shut several times, her vision still dark at the corners despite these efforts. “Tired,” she replied plainly as she stared at the clock, brain initially almost too sluggish to determine what it read. “Isn’t it a bit too early for visiting hours?” She knew that her memory wasn’t currently at its best, but a memory stirred involving someone trying to see her and a nurse shooing them away, citing the policy as their argument faded into the blackness of sleep.

“Not if you’re family,” Haruka answered with a grin, although she took that moment to glance down at the watch on her arm. “Visiting starts soon - bet the girls will be here right as they open it up. Are you sure you feel well enough to leave?”

“I don’t feel as though I have much option,” she sighed, head sagging against the pillow behind it, the one that hadn’t improved from Haruka’s dozen or so attempts to fluff it up. Hotaru had been correct; she was healing more quickly than a normal person would. The doctor attributed this progress to his own qualifications, unable or unwilling to see what was there instead, and Michiru had allowed him to think that was the case. But a few of the nurses didn’t seem to trust the good doctor as much as he trusted himself - the woman who had changed the bandage over her heart where the defibrillator had scorched her flesh had made a few too many comments about the now-unblemished skin for Michiru’s comfort.

“You can do anything, Michiru. We can do anything.” Haruka looked to the doorway, ensuring that they were alone before continuing in slightly hushed tones. She leaned forward co-conspiratorially, eyes alight with mischief and promise. “We could run away together, just the two of us. Let them sort out all this mess. Didn’t you say you wanted to go back to Paris this year?”

“But you hate Paris,” Michiru blurted out, her forehead crinkling as her limited cognitive function struggled to the surface, each thought threatening to sink back down to the ocean floor. “And if Serenity is allowed to rule, there will be no Paris, besides.” She pictured the Eiffel Tower replaced by a huge crystal shard and wrinkled her nose in distaste.

“Maybe - or maybe they can beat her without us. We could be eating pastries and drinking wine this time tomorrow, if you wanted.” It was a careful argument, measured and thought out and so unlike Haruka’s usual rash insistence that it seemed somehow more logical than the alternative.

Because of this, Michiru was running out of arguments against the temptation of flight. She had always known herself to be selfish, and often a coward besides, and she could think of no better Eden than the penthouse suite of a fine hotel, Haruka ordering copious room service between rounds of intimacy under the silken sheets -

She forced those thoughts out of her head before they threatened to swallow her up, definitively shaking her head in response to the proposition. Michiru had bitten the apple long ago, the first time her fingers touched the warm metal rod and felt the call of the sea at her command; she knew that she could never remain in that garden paradise after knowing such destruction, lest she decimate its beauty. “What about the Mission, Haruka? Were you not always the one who loved the Princess so?” The argument was all wrong, all backwards - shouldn’t she be the one wishing to flee, to escape the destiny she had so loathed?

“My Princess is dead. I have no one left to protect.” Haruka leaned forward, eyes smoldering with heat and intensity as she swore her next words, a devotion deep as prayer falling from her lips. “No one - except you.”

Michiru felt her heart thud and flip wetly in her chest, a combination of joy and confusion that muddled the ability to feel either emotion in its entirety. A reply did not come swiftly, but mercifully she was saved the trouble by a knock from the doorway of her hospital room, Hotaru’s pale fist rapping against the wooden doorframe and lingering there.

Without waiting for an invitation, Hotaru entered. She was followed by Minako, the cadence of her walk almost military, and then Rei, her usual stomping footfalls louder than the rest as she bustled in behind.

“You got everything fixed, right?” Hotaru asked as she stopped at the foot of the bed, crossing her arms impatiently.

“And good morning to you all as well,” Michiru snipped, knowing that perhaps she deserved no niceties but wishing for them all the same, especially from the girl she had once looked after as though she were her own. “Yes, everything is taken care of.”

“Good,” Minako answered, ignoring the snide remark. “Once we get you home, Hotaru has volunteered to use her healing powers on you intermittently. It’ll help the healing happen even faster.”

“Thank you,” she replied frankly, trying to catch Hotaru’s gaze as the younger girl pointedly looked out of the window to her right.

Minako snorted. “Don’t take it as a favor; we need all four of us if we have any chance of taking down Serenity, especially now that she has Mercury with her.”

“Five,” Michiru automatically corrected, also choosing to ignore the slight handed to her, the two exchanging blows in a more intense version of their usual verbal sparring, the training foils replaced with thin, sharp blades that required a deft ballet to dodge.

The three women standing at the bottom of her bed looked at one another with indiscernible expressions before Rei stepped closer to Michiru, eyes fixed firmly on her own. “Michiru, there are four of us.”

Michiru shook her head and looked at Haruka, still sitting in the corner, her expression neutral as she watched the exchange. “Unless the fundamentals of basic mathematics have been altered during my absence, I am counting five. You, Hotaru, Minako, Haruka, and myself.” She punctuated each name by gesturing loosely towards the corresponding woman, their eyes following her movements.

“Shit,” Minako cursed under her breath.

“I told you,” hissed Hotaru at the same time. Rei was silent as she turned to glare at them both, and Minako turned away from the bed, her expression hidden from view. Rei inhaled deeply before perching on the bed next to Michiru, the mattress sagging under her weight.

“Michiru, where’s Haruka?” she asked, her tone that nearly-gentle lilt she sometimes used with Usagi when she was being particularly difficult, a patient schoolteacher imparting a lesson on some unruly child.

She huffed somewhat, unaccustomed to being patronized by anyone, let alone one of very few people that she would consider a friend. “She’s right there,” Michiru indicated, again pointing to the corner where Haruka sat sideways in the chair, her back resting against the wall. “She’s been here since I woke up.”

Rei opened her mouth to say something, but Minako whipped around in a flurry of blonde hair and raised her face up to meet Michiru’s gaze, tears streaming down her cheeks even as her eyes were filled with fury. “Haruka’s dead.”

Michiru felt her heart burst open and drop, hemorrhaging blood and bile into her stomach as it twisted and roiled in her gut. Her eyes moved unbidden to the corner chair, where Haruka was casually engaged in staring at the ceiling. “That’s not possible,” Michiru whispered, the words shaking as her breaths heaved unsteadily.

“Oh, it’s more than possible,” Minako answered coldly, her voice a sword as it was unsheathed, the metallic scraping present over every syllable. “It happened. You didn’t stab the monster; you stabbed Uranus - you stabbed Haruka - instead.” She let out a bitter snort, and it was the sound of the blade pushing through flesh. “You’d think you’d remember killing your own partner.”

Michiru shook her head wildly, hands clenching the hospital sheets as they balled into tight fists at her sides. “Whatever idea of a joke you are presenting, it is not funny, Minako,” she hissed, never taking her eyes off of Haruka, almost afraid that if she looked away, the woman would disappear into the wind.

Rei took hold of her hand and Michiru startled slightly at the contact, her gaze moving to the woman on her bed instinctively. The hand squeezed hers carefully, avoiding the IV line, and all Michiru could focus on was the fact that Rei’s middle finger’s nail polish was chipped, a piece of the red missing to reveal the pale pink underneath, naked and exposed. “She’s telling the truth, Michiru,” Rei said in tones almost hushed enough to be a whisper, a sort of pleading in her eyes that Michiru pretended not to see as she looked back to the chair where Haruka still sat, handsome and smiling and real.

“I told you we should have run away together,” Haruka murmured sadly, a wry grin on her face. She pulled a perfectly red apple from her pocket and took a bite, letting the juices run down her chin.

#DUN DUN DUN #my writing #commissioned work #sittingoverheredreaming #fanfiction #sailor moon #michiru kaioh #sailor neptune #haruka tenoh #sailor uranus #hotaru tomoe #sailor saturn #rei hino #sailor mars #minako aino #sailor venus #character death mention #i have been SO EXCITED to write this part #y'all do not even KNOW

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