#worst prequel ever written | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

the-halloween-jack · 2 months ago

Text

Asphyxiated ✢ Bruce Wayne

Synopsis: Y/N’s once-adoring relationship with the charming Bruce Wayne begins to unravel as his nightly disappearances and distant demeanour create an insurmountable chasm between them. Unaware of his double life as the infamous Batman, Y/N is left to wonder where she went wrong, seeking solace in an old friend, Jonathan Crane. Bruce Wayne x Reader, female pronouns. This piece is not plot-specific, so any iteration of Bruce will work. Though I wrote it with Christian Bale in mind. Warnings: Angst (there's a lot, sorry), canon typical violence (not overly descriptive). Masterlist

Note: This is my first time writing for Christian Bale's Batman, and I can definitely see myself writing for him a lot more; god, I love him. I would also love to thank my lovely friend @lettherebemorelight for helping me with this plot.

Disclaimer: I have since written a prequel to this piece, you by no means have to read it, but if you do, here is the link.

Words: 7,292k

She had once known warmth in his embrace. His open arms beckoned her with a promised safety, drew her in with steady reassurance.

But that warmth had long since dissipated. In its wake, it left behind an empty, desolate bed, cold sheets, and a gnawing uncertainty festering deep within her. Bruce Wayne was slipping through her fingers, their love was fraying at the edges, and try as she might, she could not halt its relentless unraveling. Y/N was at a loss; she could not make sense of it.

The nights were the worst. Y/N would shift in their bed, reaching instinctively for the warmth that now so often evaded her, his warmth, only to find his side untouched, brisk against her moon-ridden skin. She would hear the ceaseless ticking of the clock, each of its hand's faint circuits mocking her with the unremitting absence of the man she adored.

She would lie there, vacant eyes gazing above her, with the remnants of her dream shimmering at the edges of her vision and fading into her memory. The uncertain haze of her unconscious contrivance left a burning at the base of her throat as she fought against her tears. She would always dream of him, and though she was met with twisted caricatures of what their love had once been, she pined for sleep to drag her under its unrelenting grasp once more, simply to reunite with them.

And then, come morning, he would finally show, always interminably long past the promised hour. His drawn movements weighed down with lassitude, and his words bare of any real explanation.

‘Something came up.’ He would reach for her hand and whisper it haphazardly against her hair, in the muted light of dawn shining through their panoramic windows. His words were always nonchalant, as though late-night escapades did not stray far from convention. Bruce would then press a distracted kiss to her forehead before heading to the shower, leaving her alone on their bed, her arm falling slack to her side once more as he drifted away and out of her grasp.

She wanted to believe him; she yearned for it. But there was something in the way his shoulders tensed under her timid caress, in his taut hesitation before offering any answer. It twisted at her stomach and made it coil with unease.

She had tried speaking to Alfred, desperate to understand. The older man, a perpetual fountain of wisdom and warmth, could only ever offer her a tight smile and a soft excuse.

‘Master Wayne has a great many responsibilities, Miss.’

He would always say the same thing, and it was not an answer, not truly. He was speaking without saying anything at all.

Y/N would not miss how his smile evaded his eyes, turning to pity. Alfred felt sorry for her, and her mind was reeling for the catalyst.

She used to tell herself it was better not to ask, that silence was safer. But that silence had since turned into distance, and that distance was unbearable.

When they had first started dating, she felt like the luckiest woman alive. Bruce Wayne—handsome, charming and kind—made her feel like the centre of the universe. But now, spiraling into her dejection, she felt like she was standing at the edges of a macrocosm she no longer belonged to, staring in and hammering at its unabating walls.

Bruce remained steeped in shadow, staring out into the murk that sheathed Gotham like an integument. The familiar weight of the suit clung to his body like a second skin; it was his mind that made it feel as though he was suffocating, a heaviness that seemed impossible to rid himself of. His gaze flickered to the clock on the cave wall—another night spent apart from her. Another night, he had failed her.

He could still discern her face clearly in his mind, how it had looked before all this. Her lips would curve into a dulcet smile when she saw him, a tenderness would reach her eyes when he held her close. It was not just love he felt when he gazed upon her—it was a need. She anchored him, gave him something to cling to in a city that constantly tried to drag him under, take him somewhere darker, twisted.

But now? There was nothing but distance between them, a chasm of unspoken words and apologies; it seemed nothing could bridge the gap.

Bruce clenched his fists, leaning his weight against the cool stone of the cave, head falling back against its concrete foundations. He wanted to tell her. He wanted to admit everything, every single detail — he wanted to make her understand why he could not be the man she deserved.

But the words never came.

He could not let them.

He had convinced himself over and over again that this was for her own good. She need not know. He could not inflict her with the weight of his world. The dangers, the violence. The darkness and the murk. None of it.

He was not blind to the fact she was pulling away; he was making a stranger of her. Bruce did not miss how her eyes, in the gleam of dawn, would search his with that dreaded unspoken question, the one he could never answer.

It was imperative for her safety.

If she knew, if she understood what he did when the night fell and the city beckoned its protector, she would be at risk. If she knew he was the Batman, she would become a target. A pawn in a deadly game that he could not protect her from, a game he could not win.

He had seen it happen before; too many people who cared for him had suffered. He would not let that happen to her. Not when it was within his power to keep her away from it, to suspend her above the reservoir that engulfed him.

But the guilt ate away at him regardless. The empty promises, the way he would brush her off with some vague excuse, knowing she would never get the truth, knowing she did not believe his lies. He hated it. God, he hated it.

But what other choice did he have? She was not just his lover—she was his heart; she was akin to the blood that flowed through his veins; she was life. If Y/N knew, if she saw the man he truly was, she would leave him. She would never forgive him.

He did not deserve her forgiveness.

And the thought of losing her, of watching her walk away, was a torment worse than any form of hell, its torture paling in comparison. He could never survive it.

It was for her own good.

His mind repeated this mantra like a prayer, something to hold onto as he watched her slip further and further from his embrace. But no matter how hard he tried to convince himself that it was the right thing to do, the truth gnawed at him, unfurled like caustic tendrils within his abdomen. The expanse between them had become too wide to ignore.

If she knew, if she knew the truth…

He would never be able to keep her safe.

Bruce’s hand hovered over his phone, his fingers trembling with the desire to call her. To hear her voice, to hear her ask him where he had been, what he had done. She felt so close, yet so entirely out of reach.

The rational part of him — the Batman — told him it was better this way. She would be safer if she stayed in the dark, if she never knew the man he truly was. But somewhere deep inside, in a plane where Bruce Wayne still existed within him, he did not believe it; he knew this was not what she needed.

The truth of it was that the Batman was the real him; Bruce Wayne was the façade, an image of the man he yearned to be, the likeness of the man Y/N deserved.

So, he kept her away. Ensured she remained in the dark, drowning in his guilt, persuading himself it was for her own good. Because if he told her, if she saw what he truly did when the sun went down, she would leave him. And that, in the end, was the one thing he could not survive. He was too selfish to allow it.

His eyes flickered to the suit, to the mask now gripped, with pale knuckles, in his unyielding hands, the mask that concealed his true identity. To the symbol of the man he had to be, to protect Gotham, and to protect her — by not telling her the truth.

But it did not feel like protection anymore. It felt akin to betrayal.

He pressed his eyes shut, the weight of it all crashing down upon him. He was not a hero. He was not even the man he had once hoped he could be.

He was a liar.

And she was slipping through his fingers; he was losing her.

It had started as small exchanges, polite words over coffee when their paths crossed amidst the twisting, serpentine alleys of Gotham City. Then, lunches at cafés, after that, afternoon walks through parks. It was the comfort of familiarity that had drawn her in, the sequestered ease of conversation with someone who had known her before her world became so complicated, so delicate.

Jonathan Crane listened when she spoke, his sharp mind quick to offer observations, to make her laugh when she had forgotten how. And she needed that, needed someone to remind her that she was not invisible, that she was not losing herself in the silence of an empty home, a chilling manor.

Because it was not just the empty bed anymore.

Y/N found herself growing accustomed to the silence that followed Bruce’s ever-present absence. There were no longer any excuses, no more explanations to be had. She did not ask. She simply waited, quietly, biding her time, until he would return to her, distorted, in some fragmented form of himself — always just a little bit further out of her reach.

The coffee would grow cold. The breakfast table remained untouched as she piercingly stared at the empty seat opposite her, mind whirling. Bruce was always sleeping, analogous with a nocturnal creature. The shadows beneath his eyes seemed permanent now, etched into the crevices of his face; in this way, they were very much alike. She would stare dolefully at the toll he took within her complexion.

It was becoming too much to bear — the distance, the constant, unceasing unraveling of everything she had known and cherished. She would go on pretending, to herself and to others, that things were fine, that the silence was not loud enough to drown her, but she was gasping for air, trying in vain to ease her asphyxiation.

She had tried everything, every little trick she could muster, to fill the void between them. She tried to meet him halfway, to carve out small moments that would make him feel like the man she once adored. But these futile endeavours were like stitching a wound that had long since festered.

And it was Jonathan Crane who made it easier.

Their meetings were innocent. Just old friends reconnecting. A simple chat over coffee, an afternoon stroll to catch up. Nothing more. But with each conversation, the air between them shifted. The rhythm of their exchanges became familiar, comfortable, safe—something she could almost rely on, like a steady pulse. Jonathan was there when she needed him. He listened. He did not push. He was not an enigma like Bruce, wrapped in layers of secrets she could never quite peel back. She felt like she could breathe again.

She noticed the slight curve of his lips when he smiled. The glint in his eyes when he found something interesting in her thoughts. There was a sharpness to him that kept her alert, something she could not quite place. But it did not alarm her — not yet.

And so, she allowed herself to lean into this unwavering presence, drawn to it like a moth to a flickering fire, not yet aware that the inferno would singe her just the same. She did not notice how the conversations between them shifted from casual, lighthearted exchanges to something more intimate. There was unresistable comfort in the way he seemed to understand her pain, her quiet, gnawing desperation. He did not push her for answers; he simply gave her the space to find them within herself. He quietly guided her toward the conclusion he had already been forming.

‘I know you’re not one to speak your mind often,’ he remarked one afternoon, as they sat in a secluded corner of a café, ‘but I can see it in your eyes, you know. You’re asking yourself all the wrong questions.’

Y/N looked up at him, eyebrows furrowing. ‘What do you mean?’

He smiled again, this time a little softer, a little more knowing. ‘You’re trying to find out what you did wrong, aren’t you? Why Bruce is pulling away.’

She hesitated, the words teetering on her tongue, but she couldn’t speak them aloud—not yet. Instead, she simply nodded, her finger faintly circling the rim of her coffee cup.

Jonathan continued, his voice measured, calm. ‘Sometimes, when people change… we forget that they’re changing for reasons beyond us. But what I think you’re failing to see, Y/N, is that you’re not the cause. You never were.’

This whole time, she had been asking herself what she had done wrong. Instead, should she have been asking what he was doing wrong?

It was the first time someone had told her that. Not Alfred, not even Bruce himself. His words settled into her chest, warmth chasing away the cold that had been so enduring.

But underneath that warmth, there was a hint of something else—a flicker of curiosity, or perhaps something darker, lingering just beneath the surface. What had he been keeping from her?

She did not see it. Not yet.

Bruce brooded in silence. The jealousy eroded him, made him bitter and cold, as he watched Y/N draw closer to Crane. He had seen them together more and more, like a slow, insidious shadow creeping closer to everything he was desperately trying to hold onto, enveloping her and stealing her from his sight.

His suspicions flared, each casual encounter between the two of them fueling the fire within him. He would track their meetings, silent and calculating. How many times had they met this week? How long had they been talking before she left with a smile on her face? A smile that had not been directed at him for what seemed a lifetime, a smile he would do a great many things to receive once more.

He had been foolish, had he not? Bruce could not decide which was worse—the slow, inevitable fall of his relationship with Y/N or the suffocating realisation that he was already too late.

There were nights when the bitterness was overwhelming. He would stare at the monitor in the Batcave, unable to concentrate, watching the movements of Gotham’s criminals as they spilled into the streets, oblivious to the wars they waged. All he could think about was the way Crane’s smile lingered in his mind, how it made his blood simmer and his chest tighten.

It was not just the jealousy. No. He was not stupid. He had seen enough of Crane’s work to know there was something wrong with him—something dark, lurking beneath the façade of a charming, polite man.

Everything she and Bruce had suffered was designed to keep her safe, though his efforts were in vain; he had pushed her away to safeguard her, but in her isolation, she turned to someone precarious.

Crane was luring Y/N into the imperilment he had been tirelessly attempting to shield her from; the very notion of it was sickening.

She was slipping away. She was beginning to look at Crane with something in her eyes, something that was not there before, a curiosity, an ease — a trust.

And Bruce could do nothing to halt it.

The suspicions were creeping in slowly for her, like soft inclinations in the rifts of her mind, barely perceptible at first. Of course, there were the large things — his sudden disappearances at night, his long sleeps during the day.

But then, bruises would blossom on his arms, and he would rush to conceal them behind clothes, to hide them before she could distinguish them. There were the late-night phone calls that always seemed to be cut short when her presence became known to him. There was his perennial fixation on the news and his rush to leave every time an active emergency broke.

She was not naïve. She saw the patterns.

Y/N perceived the unsavoury connection between Gotham’s most elusive figure and the man she loved. But the idea that Bruce could be the Batman was still too far-fetched, too unbelievable to fully take root within her beliefs, to alter her reality.

There were moments. Fleeting moments when she would see something in his eyes, in the way he moved, in the way his voice carried, moments that she could only describe as…

Haunted.

She did not want to believe it. She did not want to acknowledge the possibility. The inclination that Bruce had been hiding something from her was almost too painful to entertain, but the evidence was mounting, smothering. Every time she questioned him, his answers became more distant, more rehearsed, more evasive.

Bruce had been trailing them for weeks now, his shadow lurking behind as they shared fleeting moments of companionship, the kind that burned with familiarity and ease, a type of connection he had once known. He knew it was wrong. He knew it was sick, perverted even. There were countless awful words that could describe his behaviour, but he rationalised it; he told himself he was only worried for her safety. And he was; this was not a deception. But Bruce could not deny the burning there, the acid that would sink down and simmer in the base of his throat every time he saw him touch her.

He would watch, vision burning red, fists clenched, as Crane guided her through doors, hand rested on her lower back. Bruce would visibly cringe as Crane placed his slender hand on her shoulder as she made him laugh. Every time he saw them together—quiet conversations over coffee, casual strolls through parks—something dark inside him twisted. A ghastly sensation he could not name, a vulnerability he would never let anyone see, a jealousy he had, at this point, never known; it was foreign to him.

Tonight, he could no longer bear it. The dreadful images plaguing his mind, of Y/N’s laughter in the company of another man, had piled up until they were an intolerable weight. He needed to see for himself. He needed to know if she was truly slipping away or if, perhaps, he could still save her from the seemingly ineluctable distance between them.

To save himself from the pain of her harrowing departure.

He followed them from a distance, keeping himself shrouded in shadow as they walked together, their movements eased and unburdened. He watched them as they reached the park, a secluded part of Gotham, where trees grew thick and branches cloaked them in gloom.

Bruce lingered in the shadow of a nearby building, hidden from their view, his eyes narrowed on Y/N’s form, her back to him as she walked a few steps ahead of Crane. His heart pounded in his chest, his breath shallow. Something inside him, perhaps the instinct of a man who had seen too much loss, who had felt too many betrayals, sensed it. This was more than simple companionship.

Then, it happened.

Jonathan Crane stepped closer to Y/N, and for a moment, everything seemed to freeze. Bruce watched with bated breath. The air was drawn taut with a tension; it could have been sliced with a blade, a strain that needed no words to be understood. And then, with a smooth, calculated motion, Crane cupped Y/N’s face and kissed her.

Time seemed to stretch in that moment; in the span of a single heartbeat, the world seemed to slow to a suffocating crawl. Bruce’s stomach turned, and his throat closed. He had watched it happen—watched the betrayal unfold before his very eyes—and in that moment, he could almost feel it. The fracture of everything he had once held dear, the very thing he had worked so hard to protect, had now slipped from his grasp.

He could not move. He could not breathe.

Y/N’s face had been tilted up towards Crane, her expression soft, vulnerable. But Bruce did not see her eyes in Crane’s approach — he did not take in the hesitation there. He failed to see the way her body stiffened, her hands pressing against his chest, urging him to step back. All he saw was the kiss. The final straw. The moment that would unravel everything.

He turned sharply, his heart pounding in his ears, and walked away.

He did not hear the faint sound of her voice, calling out Crane’s name, pleading.

Y/N did not know how long she stood there, still reeling from the kiss. It had caught her off guard, an intimacy she had not expected and one she had certainly not reciprocated. And for a split second, her mind faltered. But only for a split second. In the moment the weight of what had happened settled, she knew something was wrong.

She pushed away from Crane, her heart thumping in her chest; he let her go easily.

‘I can’t…’ She stepped back, her voice trembling, hands still raised, unsure of whether the words were for herself or for him. ‘This… this isn’t right.’

Crane did not say anything for a moment, simply watching her, his eyes calculating. His lips twitched, but it was not a smile. It was something darker. Something she had not seen before.

But she did not wait for his response. Nor did she want to.

Y/N turned quickly and stumbled away, not caring if he called out to her or how he took her sudden departure. Her feet carried her swiftly, her breath sharp in the night air. She could still feel the weight of his kiss; it prickled against her skin and lingered there. Though it had meant nothing — nothing at all.

It was not until she was far enough away that she stopped, her phone already in her hand. She needed to talk to Bruce. She needed to explain, to plead and beg for his understanding.

Her fingers hovered over the screen, anxiety eating at her consciousness. With shaking hands, she scrolled through her contacts, found Bruce’s name, and pressed the dial button.

It rang once. Twice. Three times.

The screen flickered as it went to voicemail.

Her stomach plummeted.

Once the dreaded high-pitched note sounded, indicating it was her time to speak and keeping true to his unrelenting distance, she rushed out a flurry of words; she needed him to understand, to know and believe how much she loved him. To know how little Jonathan meant to her, how much he paled in his comparison.

She ended the voicemail, her hand trembling as she stared at the screen, as if hoping for it to light up with his name—hoping for him to reach out to her, to offer the words of comfort, of validation, she so wretchedly longed for.

But the screen remained blank.

Bruce’s fingers tightened around the steering wheel, his jaw clenched tight. He knew she had called, but he had left her to go to voicemail. He did not want her explanation, her excuse; he understood the words would feel like a knife twisting in his chest, offering no reprieve. He knew he could not face her; he knew he could not answer her call without breaking, without crumbling under his despair.

He had seen what he had seen, and no explanation, no words from her, and no amount of time could erase that vile image from his mind — the way Crane’s lips had pressed against hers. The way he had held her, as if she belonged to him.

But she did not; Y/N was his. Or was she? He thought once more of the wedge he had driven between them, the walls he had established higher and higher until she was left standing on the other side, wondering if she could ever reach him again. He was not blind to the way she would observe him, sadness steeped within her eyes. Bruce clenched his fists, a deep ache forming in his chest. Had he pushed her away so far that she had to find comfort in the arms of another man? His own insecurities, his unspoken fears, had they created a chasm between them that was too wide to cross now? The thought of losing her, of her slipping through his fingers, falling into the grasp of another — was more than he could bear. Yet, deep down, he knew it was not Crane who had pulled her away. It was him.

Maybe he knew, deep down, that she had pulled away from Crane’s clutch. He knew she would not have wanted this. But this apprehension was futile now. The seed of doubt had already been sowed within his reality, and it had taken root in his heart like a venom.

His phone vibrated on his dash again, informing him of a voicemail left unheard. He could not bring himself to listen to it. The voice that had so recently been a source of comfort, of love, now felt like a weight. Her words would be a reminder of everything he was failing to give her—everything he could not be.

He drove off into the night, unable to find the courage to turn around.

Not yet.

Y/N’s mind raced as she roamed, and the city’s hum buzzed in the background. She was not ready to go back to the manor — not yet. Not until she could find a way to break through the walls he had built around himself, not before she could get through to him. She glanced at her phone once more; the silence radiating from it was somehow, completely illogically, deafening. The weight of what had happened hung over her, and despite everything, she could not bring herself to face him, in fear she might break.

How could she reach him when he refused to answer? Where was he? Her heart ached at the thought of him, so distant, so unreachable in his silent pain. She needed to fix things, needed to make him understand, before they lost each other completely. But the longer she wandered the streets, the more uncertain she became. What if there was no way back? What if they were already too far gone? She sighed and pushed the thought away as her footsteps quickened. The uncertainty settled deep in her chest as she realised she was not sure where she was going anymore. Y/N stumbled backward, her breath quickening as the dark figures loomed closer. She realised too late that she had backed into an alleyway, the weight of the situation settling heavy, like lead, in her chest. Her heart is pounding, her instincts screaming for her to run, to flee, but her nerves betray her. She glanced around herself frantically. She realised with a fear that felt like ice down her throat that there was no escape. One of them lurks closer, the flicker of the streetlamp catching the glint of a weapon in his hand. Her pulse thunders in her ears as she tries to steady her rattling breath. This was not supposed to happen. She was not supposed to be here. This was not supposed to be how it ended.

Her mind races, but it is too late. She knows it is too late.

There is nowhere to hide. The heinous men are closing in around her, swallowing her up. She is trapped.

A wave of nausea hits her, a sharp, cold panic that twists her stomach into knots. Her thoughts are a blur, but one thing is clear: she has to reach him.

She closes her eyes and forces herself to calm down, focusing on the small silver ring Bruce had given her — her last hope. The same ring she thought was merely a gift, a meaningless yet sweet gesture. But now she understands. She remembers the way he had pressed it into her palm, his gaze full of a quiet intensity that she had not fully grasped at the time.

‘If you ever need me…' he had said, his voice low, tone heavy with something unspoken.

‘This will help me find you.’

She recalled the confusion she had felt when he gifted it to her, though she had not dwelled on it at the time. But now, she was kicking herself; it all made sense. She had considered it before, but she was always careful to cut the notion short, halt it before it could fully form, before it became too real.

Bruce was the Batman and she had already known it; of course he was.

The late-night escapades, the sleep-riddled day times, the empty dinner tables, the cuts, the bruises and the urgent, poorly explained disappearances whenever something terrible had happened within the city.

Her hands trembled as she slipped the ring from her finger, the cool metal feeling foreign against her skin; it harboured hope. She placed it carefully between her fingertips and pressed just hard enough to activate the concealed mechanism inside.

The tiny, almost imperceptible whir of the system coming to life is the only sound she hears. And then, as she places it upon her finger once more, the faintest of beeps. A signal sent.

Her chest feels tight as she forces her sight upward, to look upon her soon-to-be attackers, forcing herself to maintain their stare. She is aware of their figures closing in again, of their eyes boring into her, hungry and cold. But her focus is on the single thought that keeps her grounded: He will come.

A sharp laugh echoes from one of the men. They are talking, but the words are unintelligible to her; she cannot hear them over the pounding in her ears. She makes no effort to answer. Her gaze shifts further upward, towards his signal illuminating the murk of Gotham’s night sky, and for a split second, she lets herself believe she can feel him out there—somewhere in the dark, coming to her.

She has to hold on. She has to hold on just a little longer.

Her vision starts to blur, the world becoming corroded at its edges, her body beginning to betray her, but she does not move. Makes no effort to run. She stays still, waiting. Waiting for him.

The night is too quiet, an empty expanse of soundless tension that suffocates with each breath. Bruce’s grip on the steering wheel is tight, his fingers stiff, trying to suppress the tremor that is slithering into his limbs. His chest feels hollow, a dull ache that has been consuming him since the moment he received her distress signal. The weight of it pressed down upon him, pushing the air from his lungs until he could not breathe at all.

The ring. The ring he had hidden a distress mechanism in. In this moment, it is all he has; it is what tells him she is still alive, that she is still fighting, though he can feel her slipping away with every second. He does not have time to think, does not have time to wrestle with the inevitability of what is coming. He pushes the Batmobile harder; the kiss, the betrayal, it is all but a faint memory; it no longer matters.

His heart ticked like a bomb, each beat augmenting the terror that wore at him. It’s too late. It’s already too late. He could not end the foul thought from hammering within his mind, a thought that burrowed deeper within him with every passing moment. But he pushed forward, went faster, even though every fibre of his being told him she was already lost.

He could not afford to think like this. She deserved better.

Bruce did not remember stopping the car. He did not remember climbing from its front seat.

As he moved, he felt akin to a puppet held suspended by strings; he was not in control of himself. He did not know how he made it to her; the time between the last glimpse of the signal on his dash and the moment he knelt beside her, in her blood, was lost to the haze of adrenaline and dread.

But then, he is there.

Her body is crumpled, macabre, like a broken doll, her form so still it makes his heart skip a beat. Her attackers were nowhere in sight. The blood pooling beneath her seems to grow darker by the second, stark and seeping into the crevices of the pale, illuminated pavement. She is breathing—just barely. It is the kind of shallow, desperate breath that sends a jolt of panic straight through his spine.

For a moment, he does not move, hands suspended above her. The world feels frozen, a long, aching pause; like it is waiting for him to act. But he cannot — he is paralysed. The sight of her, broken like this, shatters everything inside him, destroys everything he is. He wants to scream, wants to rage against this fate, but all that fills his mouth is the taste of failure, it burns like acid; he chokes on it.

‘Bruce…’

As soon as she speaks, a burning grief chases away the fear that had kept him still; he feels this morbid flame flow through his system and takes her into his arms. Her voice is a faint rasp, as if his name is all she can summon. Her eyes flutter open, and it is as though she is seeing him for the first time. Her gaze is distant, unfocused. Her fingers twitch, but they do not reach out for him—they do not have the strength. She is already too far gone.

But then, those eyes meet his, and something breaks in him, something deep and painful, something he has not allowed himself to feel in so long. She knows. And it is not anger or betrayal that he sees in her eyes. It is only sorrow, and love, and an ache that mirrors his own.

‘Take off the mask,’ she whispers, her words fragile like glass, much like her figure. She tries to lift her hand, but it trembles weakly, falling short as her body fights to stay alive, to keep breathing. ‘Let me see you... Please…'

Her plea hits him like a punch to the gut, and something inside him crumbles. Still supporting her, his fingers tremble as he reaches for the cowl. The motion is so slow it is almost torturous. Every inch of it feels like it is tearing him apart because once he does this — once he removes the mask — there is no going back. She will see the man beneath it, the broken man he has been hiding for so long. And it will be the last thing she sees; he knows it.

But she is asking, pleading. She wants to see him. And somehow, that small piece of her strength is enough to push him over the edge.

He takes it off.

The cool air brushed against his skin, and for the first time in years, he felt raw. Exposed. She does not flinch. Does not recoil. Not like he thought she would.

She smiles, a faint, fragile beam, as though nothing is wrong in the world; it is enough to break him completely, more than he already was. Her eyes are filled with a quiet recognition, and the corners of her lips twitch upward. ’I knew,’ she breathes, her voice shaky, but the words are certain, resolved. ‘I didn’t let myself believe it. But, I knew.’

His throat tightens and burns. He wants to tell her so many things — everything he never said, everything he kept locked away. But the words do not come. He opens his mouth, but the only thing that leaves it is a strangled sob.

Her body jerked in pain, her chest heaving. His hands let go and instead hover helplessly over her, shaking with the urge to do something, anything. His breath hitches, a desperate, choking sound that he cannot control. But there is nothing to do. Nothing. She was slipping through his fingers once more; only he could have never imagined it would be like this.

‘It’s too late…’ she whispers again, her voice so soft it is almost lost in the wind. The words catch in his throat, and he feels them like prickles puncturing and twisting deep into his skin. The agony of hearing her speak, knowing what is coming next, is enough to shatter the fragile control he has kept over himself for so long, the control that was already extinct, not since he took in her crumpled form on the blood-stained concrete.

‘I’m going to help you,’ he says, his voice cracked, a broken echo of a promise that he knows he cannot keep. He tells her over and over, as if saying it will make it true, but the words are hollow. They are not real. She is already gone; he cannot save her.

Her hand slides to his cheek, her fingers cold against his skin. She is so cold, so small, as if the life has already been drained from her completely. She looks at him with those same knowing eyes, her smile still lingering, even as the weight of the world presses down upon her chest, pushing her under.

Then she exhaled, a long, shuddering breath that shook him to his core, a breath she could not follow.

Her body goes still.

And in that moment, she is gone. Lost to the world. Empty eyes, gazing unseeingly past him and above her, facing, but not taking in the candescent signal shimmering in the ether.

And in the hollow of her absence, Bruce feels everything stop.

His world has fallen away. The darkness around him seems to stretch infinitely, suffocating him, pressing in on his chest.

Tears burn at the back of his eyes, but he refuses to let them fall. He holds her tighter, his body trembling with the weight of her loss, shaking them both. He does not let go. He cannot. He will not.

But soon enough, they come. And he quickly grasps for his cowl, tugging it over his head.

The tears finally fall. Slowly at first, then faster, until they are pouring down his face and mixing with her blood on the pavement; it is already cold, and the groan he makes at this perception is inhumane in sound. His shoulders tremble with it, a raw, guttural sob tearing through him. It is a sound of pure grief, pure, undiluted agony — the sound of a man who has nothing left but the wreckage he cradles.

He does not care anymore.

He does not care when the officers arrive. He does not care when they try to pull him away from her. He does not care about anything but the ever-growing coldness of her being, the weight of her death pressing down on him like nothing had before.

They cannot make him leave.

But eventually, they do. The silence that follows, the vacantness of his arms without her weight, is so absolute, so entirely harrowing. Alone in the manor, he stumbled to his phone, to the voicemail, the one she had left him earlier, after the call he ignored. The voicemail she had left when she was still alive, still reaching out to him with hope. Hope he did not deserve.

He pressed play.

Her voice fills the room, shaky, unsure. ‘Bruce, please, pick up,’ she had whispered under her breath, her voice shaking with anguish. ‘I… I don’t know what happened. I don’t know why it happened. But, please, I need you to understand. This… this wasn’t what I wanted. Jonathan… he kissed me, but I pulled away. I swear. I… I wasn’t trying to hurt you, Bruce. Please, just… just understand. Please. I need you. I love you.’

She paused for a moment, her end going silent. Bruce had thought it finished when her small voice spoke up once more,

‘I love you,’ she had repeated, ‘God… I love you,’ she choked on her sob, trying desperately for air, ‘I love you so much, Bruce. Please, don’t shut me out. I need you. I love you…’

The static cuts through the air when the message ends. The words carved into him like scars that will never fade, worse than any real affliction.

He collapsed into their bed, a broken shell of a man, his body wracking with silent sobs. His hands shake, his chest heaving with each breath, but he cannot stop it. He cannot cease his crying; it sputters out.

And as the tears flowed, it felt like the world around him was disintegrating, leaving only an empty void where she used to be. He reached out, and the cold sheets of her side made him heave harder. Alfred is in the hall, trying to get through the door. He wants to take him in his unyielding embrace and tell him it was not his fault, but it is a lie. Alfred was attempting to suppress his own sobs, though Bruce could still hear them; they pierced his ears like needles.

He can still feel the cold weight of her body in his arms, the way her breath slowed to nothing, the fragile, fleeting warmth that slipped through his fingers like sand. His mind replays the moment over and over, like a cruel loop he cannot escape, a perpetual torment.

If only he had gone to her after the kiss. The thought is bitter, venomous.

He had let his fear — his overwhelming need to protect her, to keep her safe — push him away, convincing himself it was better to stay distant, to be the Batman, rather than risk anything more. But now, he cannot help but see it for what it truly was, cowardice. She was his. She had always been his, and if he had just confronted her, talked to her, if he had given her the chance to explain that the kiss meant nothing, then maybe, just maybe, she would still be alive. She would have told him the truth, and they would have worked through it together. They would have gone home together. They would have been happy.

But instead, he let her fade away, believing the lie that keeping his distance was the right thing to do. The guilt claws at him, a suffocating weight, each breath sharp and ragged. He was not there when she needed him most. He was not there when it mattered. And now she is gone.

And the words she said echo through him once more, louder than anything else:

‘I love you so much, Bruce. Please, don’t shut me out. I need you. I love you…’

But it is too late for those words now. It is too late for anything.

Here is the link to the prequel if you're interested.

Every comment and piece of advice is welcomed and appreciated <3

#bruce wayne #bruce wayne x reader #batman x reader #bale!batman #batman #dc comics #dc #gotham #jonathan crane #scarecrow #christopher nolan #x reader #oneshot #angst #alfred pennyworth

168 notes · View notes

jaggedamethyst · 1 month ago

Text

golden boy (prequel) ⭐️💫

jayce talis x f!reader, 4.4k words

content: the story of the day you met jayce talis two years ago...immediately after the worst moment of your life. (can be read as a one-shot, but is a prequel to my golden boy short series!)

notes/warnings: 18+ minors dni, angst, f!receiving oral, m!receiving oral, swallowing, brief handjob (wtf is the tumble phrasing for this bruh), unprotected p in v, pulling out, bondage?? (with a tie, i got creative), sub!jayce/dom reader, lmk if I missed anything as always, not proofread...my head hurting girl

ps: golden boy is still my favorite thing I've written ever...I'm happy i got to revisit them and hopefully answer some of the questions people had. even sprinkled in some of their habits that i liked and you can tell that it started from their very first interaction...its messy and somewhat unrealistic but i do think they're insanely in love. I've heard it makes people insane CTFUUU. crazy how this started over a hextech vibrator too. wtf. - amethyst 💟

series masterlist

⭑·ﾟﾟ·*:༅。.。༅:*ﾟ:*:✼✿　　✿✼:*ﾟ:༅。.。༅:*·ﾟﾟ·⭑

Living in the shadows wasn’t something you had to get accustomed to, but was rather born knowing. Life as a girl in the Undercity was unique but altogether riddled with the stench of an undeveloped community—as Piltover would say at least. You loved the stench. It was more than a foul smell—an always present layer of grime. Existing in the Lanes was to always have a film on you. Whether it be of the societal norms placed on you or the physical distinction between those living above you, you were in every way considered an other.

So it stayed the same as you grew up. Unfortunately, though, there was always an intrigue that pulled you from your hiding. No matter how hard you tried to fight it something pulled you to Piltover—to him.

It started innocently enough. You went on dates, got to know each other, and spent inexplicable amounts of time together. It would always end, though.

“I’ll miss you.”

You would smile back, searching for any indication of a lie. You never saw one.

“Can’t I stay? Just-“ you huffed at the break in your voice. “Just this once? Please?”

“It’s best you don’t.” A hand would find your face or arm and rub it reassuringly, “I couldn’t live knowing anything happened to you.”

Lie.

You wished you could’ve picked up on it—how truly deceitful this man you’d grown to love had been.

Time passed like a whirlwind; you let yourself be swept up in the idea of a hidden romance, one that was for the two of you alone. You didn’t tell him but you would watch him sometimes, sneaking glimpses into the parts of his life you could never be part of.

He was a known man—not on the council but a close acquaintance of the renowned families. It made sense, then, that he kept you tucked away. Its okay, you’d reason. The only way to stay safe is to stay hidden. After all, it was what you were born to do.

This day was like any other, you slightly covered, hooded, and watching while the object of your adoration smiled in conversation. The difference came in the form of a woman you’d never seen, more importantly the newborn that lie between her hands.

It didn’t take you long to figure out that he had another life—one that he so skillfully kept you unaware of. The prospect only made your interest pique—your mind wandering to how he could do this so well, to be this pathological.

You didn’t confront him. In fact, you weren’t supposed to be here at all—in a sea of people waiting on an announcement. Today was progress day. You’d heard rumblings of there being a huge announcement coming to Piltover which admittedly you didn’t want to miss. Everyone had the same idea—to pack in and hear from this new scientist.

You pushed and squeezed. You mumbled apologies and excuses to snake your way through the now suffocating crowd. It was futile, though. You were forced to stand and stare.

Jayce Talis wasn’t unknown to you. You were an observer at heart, so you’d seen him around before. It was often that he was lingering, just in the background but doing nothing of significance to catch your attention—not when it was elsewhere. He looked comfortable, not with his speech but rather on stage. Jayce had the essence of a man who belonged in front of people—presenting on a day so great at this one.

You heard of this new boy, this man who would propel both cities alike into an unimaginable future. Seeing him there, speaking with a fluidity that enticed you, you knew he had to be him. He had to be the golden boy of Piltover.

Blinking your eyes, you darted them over to search for him. His stare had already been on you, his entire frame slouching in guilt. You had nothing left to offer him but you figured his wife and child were enough. You wouldn’t afford him the luxury of seeing you ever again—let alone touching you.

The end of Jayce’s speech allowed you some relief, the crowd slowly dissipating as they dispersed. You avoided eye contact, squirming into the tight spaces between people having small talk. The breeze of the outside hit you—the door opening and closing in an irregular rhythm of people entering and exiting. You were almost there, out of his life for good.

“Got somewhere to be?”

You froze at the sound of a man talking to the side of you. You perked up a bit, attempting to disguise yourself as someone who should be here, belongs here.

You cleared your throat, “I have to get home. Lots of work to do—progress day doesn’t stop…the progress.” Your face twisted at the awkward joke.

The man chuckled anyways, teetering on his feet. He let his hands clasp behind his back—exposing the tightly bound buttons of his clothing. He wore crimson and white, hints of gold and black lingering at the hems. It suited him.

“Did you enjoy my speech?”

“It was nothing short of inspirational.”

Your eyes stared into one another, daring the opposing pair to look away, and yet they didn’t.

“I should be going,” you swallowed and turned to go, a quickness in your step.

He wasn’t sure why, but he couldn’t let you leave. “It’s raining,” he blurted out. “Is that all you have to get home?” He examined you, the lack of protective wear, and a small hood over your head.

You glanced down at yourself, a crease in your brows. “Trust me, I’ll live.”

A million things flashed through his mind, one of the first being how disappointed his mom would be to know that he let a woman walk alone in the rain. After this his mind lingered, though. He felt a chill at the recollection of your sharp features—the darkness there. He racked his brain further, cursing himself at how quickly he seemed to forget the intricacies of your face already.

You were almost gone.

“Wait!”

You heard him call behind you, a low hum of surprise escaping you.

“I have an umbrella, I can walk you.”

“That’s very sweet of you,” you continued to move, “But I’m good—great!”

You wanted the emphasis to say leave me alone but it screamed at him to continue, matching your hurried steps away from the building. He didn’t speak, but moved closer and let his frame tower over you. You looked up at the sudden lack of rain pelting you, finding solace in the small shelter.

“Jayce, you’re getting yourself wet.”

He perked up at the sound of his name on your lips, secretly languishing in the sweetness. He almost forgot to acknowledge you, but settled on a shrug.

“As long as you get home unscathed.” He continued to walk, a step for your every two. You noticed how much longer his legs were than yours, twisting your lips at that. “Speaking of,” he spoke again, “Where are we headed?”

You paused, only just now realizing you were walking toward the outskirts of the city.

“I’m-“ You looked around, searching for an excuse. When one didn’t find you, you gave up. You offered him a slump in your shoulders and a following shrug, “I’m not from Piltover.”

“I know.” Jayce turned to resume his stride, slightly splashing into puddles on the ground.

“You know?”

“Mhm.”

“How?”

Without missing a beat he kept his eyes forward and pinpointed the error. “Your shoes.”

You looked down, eyes meeting your worn footwear. “I see.”

He nodded like it was the most simple thing—like there wasn’t such distance between you already. It made you look away, arms folding in on you as you huffed to yourself.

“I didn’t mean to offend you.” It was too quick. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m used to it—always have been.”

He was reading you, with a skill that came as second nature to him. Your body language, the falter in your face, the slow in your step—he noticed it.

“You shouldn’t be.” He gripped the umbrella, “You shouldn’t be used to it. I’m sorry.”

He looked down at you with a sincerity—you hoped it was true. You simply nodded, letting your feet lead him to your home.

“Thank you. This was nice of you…considerate.” You paused again, thinking better of continuing, but you had to. “You should come in.”

“Really?”

“It’s raining.” You stated plainly, like your reasoning was obvious.

“It is.” He matched your monotone.

A deep inhale resonated between you, “You can’t walk back in this weather. Besides,” you finally pushed your door open, “the least I can do is offer you somewhere to wait this out.”

He surveyed you, the way you kicked your shoes off and placed them neatly by the door. He did the same, smiling softly at the action; his mom never let him walk around with dirty shoes on either.

The effortless way you moved proved how long you’d lived here—how you could grab for something without looking or push in a piece of furniture with your hips. It was comfortable, it was home.

“I can hang your clothes for you if you like.”

You interrupted his thoughts, a pile of clothes in hand for him to swap into.

“Thank you…” He paused, kicking himself. “I don’t actually know your name-“

You interrupted him, offering your name, letting it roll off of your lips in a way that he enjoyed more than he expected. He repeated it, too, training himself to enjoy the melody—the way it lingered there.

He moved then, pushing his now dripping blazer off of his shoulders. You swallowed, looking down at the now drenched white of his clothing clinging to his skin. His shirt was the most restrictive, settled beneath his waistcoat and attached to it from the moisture of the rain.

He noticed your focus wandering across him. He moved slowly, loosening the buttons around his torso first, then the tie on his neck. “Hope I’m not too much of an intrusion-“

“Absolutely not, no.” You shook your head, “I surprisingly enjoy the company.”

“Well,” he undoes the buttons on his wrists, “It helps to be in good company, I guess.”

You nodded, reluctantly peeling your eyes away from him to head for the nearby kitchen. Water, you thought. Gosh your mouth had gotten so dry.

In the second it’d taken you to grab and fill a glass, Jayce had stripped majority of his clothing.

He spoke quickly, slightly frightened by your shocked look. “I’m sorry, I figured I shouldn’t leave a trail of my wetness all over the floors…better if there’s just one puddle, right?”

“Right,” you blinked at him, “I’ll uh-“ You motioned behind you, a thumb waving at nothing in particular. “I’ll grab the mop.”

Approaching him felt daunting. In the moments you saw him around you wouldn’t have assumed this quiet man was hiding beneath fabric. There was a sheer magnitude to him that even left his muscles to flex with little effort. You observed the movement of his body with every breath.

He reached out to you, motioning to grab the mop and clean the mess he’d made. You weren’t paying attention, more focused on the way his arms looked so powerful. You completely missed him pulling the mop stick toward his own chest, and you with it. He moved with such ease, gliding you through the puddle of water, maneuvering you like it was the most minuscule thing to do so. You didn’t let go of the mop when he thought you would, and he internally thanked himself at that. Jayce was able to look at you again finally; he observed your features intently.

Suddenly a tingle shot up and down your left side, as if it were hitting your heart and exploding outward. You could tell he felt it, whatever it was.

The feeling brewing between you was begging to be explore…bubbling like a kettle settled on a stove. It was as if the metaphorical boiling tea started to whistle then, a high-pitched screech in your ear drums telling you to just go for it.

Jayce was more of a coffee person, relishing in the wafting scent of the thick drink. He couldn’t go a day without it…and it seemed the same was true about his desire for you.

You hadn’t noticed how your breath had become short as it met his chest, completely bare against your own. Jayce watched you look down, taking in the sight of him.

He gulped and discarded the mop beside him. His hands grasped yours—replacing the mop handle. Your cluster of hands remained between you, an invisible rope forcing you to stay together.

Jayce continued with a croak, dipping his head to meet your eyes, “Hi.”

“Hi,” you replied with a shy smile.

His brow arched as he dipped down more, silently questioning if this was okay. When you met his slow movement in, he internally rejoiced.

You’d kissed people before, but this was an entirely new sensation. The man in front of you was intentional. He moved slow and showed an attention that you didn’t know was missing.

You’d gasp, overwhelmed by the gentle pressure of him. He’d make it his mission to capture that sound in his mouth, working over you to create the sound again. The rhythm in his ears of your low groans was one he could live off of—the only thing he needed for the rest of his existence. It was inexplicable the way he need to do this for you, to be good to you, to show you that you deserved only great things.

You saw that in him—and it immediately made you want to repay him. It wasn’t often that you would first sink down to your knees in front of a man, ready and willing to have all of him…but this was different—confusing.

You let out an exaggerated pop as you pulled away from Jayce’s mouth, licking over your own. His skin burned as you let a hand trail his chest, lingering as you found your way in front of his belt buckle. With a single hand you let him free of the confines of his pants. A second hadn’t passed before your hand latched onto him, smearing the wetness on the tip of him down his entire length. You watched him as you did, loving the choking sounds escaping his throat.

“I-“ He gasped, writhing a bit, “I’ve never done this.”

You arched your brow, confusion clearly covering the entirety of your face. “Never?”

He shook his head in a tight declaration, hardly visible had you not been looking so closely. “Not after just meeting, I mean.”

“Do you want to?”

You offered him an out, acknowledging how intense this must be. You’d just met him—and you knew how it felt. You understood the intricacies of always being connected in that way—feeling tethered to someone despite how little you seemed to know them. He had been that for you…before the wife and child.

Jayce didn’t want an out. In fact his face almost mixed with something of bewilderment—that he’d ever deny you. He let that feeling spring him into action, pulling you back up to your feet. Despite that sudden motion, he seemed lost…as if he didn’t know what to do from here.

“Where do you want me?” You spoke softly, hands nestled behind your back. He watched your eyelashes bat at him, the way they were intentionally spurring him on.

You observed the way he remained in a shell—reacting to even the smallest of motions by you. His blinks were slow. His shoulders straightened, his posture stiffening. His breath even hitched at the way your chest rose slightly, a bit higher with your hands behind your back.

Letting your voice lower and your head tilt, you looked him up and down slowly. “Where would you like me, Jayce?” You repeated it, keeping eye contact with him. Finally, you started to strip, removing all of your clothing. You backed up as you did so...legs eventually hitting the couch near the side of the room.

He stayed stuck in place as he watched you. Jayce was entirely focused on your frame, how much more beautiful you looked than he could’ve imagine in his own mind. His knuckles paled, fists pressing in on themselves. You sat down into the couch cushions, then, not hesitating as you let your hands sink down to play with yourself.

“Should I,” you hissed as you already felt yourself pulse around nothing. “Would you like to contribute or should I do this myself?”

There wasn’t a sound in the room beyond the slick of you and the abrupt strides Jayce made across the room. The ran pattered to offset his movement. He was eager, immediately settling on the floor in front of you.

The roles had reversed so fast.

He pulled your hips slightly, earning a yelp from you, even more so when he immediately latched his lips onto your clit. It went on like that for a while until he flattened his tongue on you, moving up and down slowly. His nose pressed just beside your clit, a sensitive spot you didn’t know you had.

It was his turn to look up at you and the way your head fell back.

The air got stuck in your throat as you moved to grip his hair. The tug didn’t stop him, only motivated him more. The thought that his tongue alone could bring such aggressive reactions from you was the reward he needed. He clawed at your thighs, the softness there a grounding sensation so different from the sting as his scalp.

He hummed into you, letting the vibration add to the feel of him on you.

“F-fuck…” your voice dragged, stuttering over itself at that. You gulped as he did it again, a hand letting go of his head to wipe over your own—your palm hitting your face in surprise.

He made a mental note at that, smiling briefly into you before pulling away.

You looked around the room, mind spiraling at how he’d worked you up so well. Your sight settled on the clothes on the floor, his discarded tie in particular. You nudged Jayce, planting a soft kiss to his temple and moving him to lean back into the couch. He smiled to himself, at the fondness of such an action.

He let himself be immersed in that feeling. You let the distraction work in your favor as the tie found its way around his wrists. You left some slack so he could be attached to the makeshift bars on your window. They sat just above your couch, a much needed addition to combat the weather and occasional rogue projectiles that seemed to make their way into fights. The Undercity was undeniably rough but it was home. The metal over your glass reminded you of that, how the path to something so amazing remained guarded at all times.

The last bit of fabric rested in your hands as you moved to straddle Jayce, a strained hiss resounding from you at the sheer thickness of his thighs. You lifted yourself a bit before sliding over the back of him, not letting him into you just yet. You rutted over his tip, letting it swirl between your folds. He could only breathe into you as you raised his hands—relinquishing any control he had.

You continued up and down him, pressing his wrists above his own head. He felt around, his fingers curling around the lowest horizontal bar. Jayce used it for stability but also as an outlet simultaneously. His grip was firm at the restriction. His arms were unable to move now that you’d tied a knot behind him—the realization only riled him up more. He was sensitive—he couldn’t take much more.

You slid your hands on his shoulder, finally leveling yourself just above him. In a slow movement—eyes locked with him—you sunk onto him about an inch. Only letting in the head of his length was torture, an insatiable need only partially fulfilled. It was worth it, though. The lack of him was driving the man just as crazy, if not more so. Observing the pinch of his brows and the slack of his jaw, low whimpers now escaping him, was enough to make you hold out a bit longer.

You smoothed a finger over the scar below his brow, an attempt to relieve the tension in him. “Be good,” you slid up and back down onto him. “Keep your hands there, okay?”

His nods were fervent, his grasp holding tighter into the pole above him.

Jayce’s words came out sort of erratic, an urgency you didn’t expect. “Please…just please,” he didn’t continue the thought—overwhelmed by you sliding down another inch onto him. “I just want to be in you…feel you.”

That was enough for you.

Inch by inch, you slowly sat into him. The mix of both your whines were almost drowned out by the rain; it was even louder now, the wind gusts swirling into a frenzy of sound. It didn’t compare, though. Not to the two of you completely wrapped in each other.

You leaned down, letting your lips fall into the crook of his neck and his onto your chest. He sucked down with all he could, it being the only way he could touch you now. You leaned back at that, squeals escaping you as you writhed into him quicker now. Your chest reddened, the burst of heat traveling up your neck. He took advantage of your nipples in his face, alternating between both as he saw fit—only letting them go when he glanced up at you, how stunning you looked.

There was a sheen of sweat on you now. You were feeling him everywhere, mostly just between your thighs where his girth filled you so much it burned. Despite this he was still long, hitting your guts with every motion into his lap. You were getting tired; the flapping of you onto his thighs became even more lewd, the space underneath you dripping in wetness from him and you.

You could feel his stares on you but settled for keeping attention on his hands, the way they struggled to stay on the bar. You let your hands meet his, ignoring the tingle that sent through your own, and wrapped it around his own. Your hands were interlocked, keeping him on the metal.

Your words slurred at him piercing into your groin over and over, that spongey spot feeling completely weak now. “C-close…are you?”

“Almost,” his voiced bobbed. “Can’t go much longer—fuck.”

The heat in you rose quickly at the weakened tone of his voice, the pure lack of control. Within a few more circles into him you were finishing, hand moving to your own clit to drag it out.

Jayce looked between you, the mess you made. He gasped at your hands soaked on yourself, applauding his own work—he was proud to serve you this way. You could use him, he didn’t care. Couldn’t care less, even.

“Shit—“ a hiccup from Jayce, “Can’t—“

Reluctantly you slipped off of him, a whine filling the room. It didn’t last long, though.

Suddenly your head was in his lap, bobbing up and down his length as you kept rubbing yourself. He heard your cries, muffled by the sound of your mouth wrapped around him. Your free hand pressed into his balls, urging him to let go. You hummed, too, letting the vibration touch his tip as it grazed the back of your throat.

His hips snapped up into you, ropes shooting into your mouth and down your throat before you could even process. It didn’t afford you the time to taste him, really, but you’d assume it was sweet. Like him.

Your legs shook beneath you as your hands slipped away. Letting yourself fall back, you surveyed your work—the consistent lingering pulse inside your walls and the way Jayce remained motionless. Your chest heaved, matching the way his rose and fell.

Your eyes fell closed, allowing you to sit in the feeling of bliss within you now. On the floor, you started to drift—only cognizant of the warmth on you.

The faint sparkle of the Sun began to shine onto your face and stirred you from sleep. Immediately grimacing, you looked over to the man beside you. He sat on the couch, not moving you from your spot but covering you snugly on the floor with a few of your blankets, a pillow under your head.

Craning your neck back allowed you to see the puddle gone, too, his clothes hanging on your laundry line.

“Hi.” He smiled, already awake and observing your every move.

You didn’t reply but instead felt something brewing in you, disgust was the closest thing to come to mind. Disgust at how quickly you’d turned this around. The same day you found out—heart completely shattered by something you thought was real—you let yourself be with a man you hardly knew. It stood to reason then that this wasn’t and could never be real. Not when you so quickly fell into it. Not when you tainted any opportunity you had at building toward something healthy.

You hated yourself, even more so that you could see a future with Jayce. The thought of him was so close, yet out of reach when you fully considered. You couldn’t do this, shouldn’t really.

“You should go.”

Jayce moved to counter, to speak and question you.

“Don’t come here anymore.” It sounded harsh. You didn’t mean for it to be. “Just…I’ll come to you, okay?” You nodded, assuring yourself that this was the right way to go—the way to be with him. “You can’t come back here, never again.”

He moved slowly, clearly stunned by your abruptness. The motions with which he pulled his own clothes off of their hanging positions and onto his body was methodical. Jayce was a machine—working step by step and assembling pieces to get a final result. It was true, though, that he’d never be whole. He wouldn’t be himself again without you beside him and couldn’t explain why that was.

He didn’t know you.

He wanted to.

He kneeled down as you sat up, slowly gliding his hand into yours. He let his fingers rub over your skin; he fought to reassure you.

The knot in your throat made you swallow and pull away.

There weren’t any words exchanged between you. You felt bad, but not enough to quell the sickening feeling in his stomach. Jayce looked at you with a clear hurt, like he’d been physically torn apart.

He huffed at that and simply asked, “When can I see you again?”

part one

#jaggedamethyst #angst #arcane #jayce talis #arcane jayce #jayce talis x you #jayce talis x reader #jayce league of legends #jayce x reader #jayce x you #jayce talis x y/n #golden boy #arcane x reader #jayce talis angst #jayce talis arcane #jayce arcane

113 notes · View notes

mono-dot-jpeg · 3 months ago

Text

focus and study - viktor

summary; in which viktor gives you a proper incentive to study hard and even helps you relieve some stress

genre/extra tags; small one shot, modern college au, smut, fluff, half baked smut, established relationship, this could be considered a prequel to my jayvik reader smut, viktor and reader were together first and jayce joined in not long after, OR jayce thought they were dating already and viktor reader thought too hard about the relationship, silly shit at the end, jayvik freak agenda, OOC viktor????, open ended

word count; 1.1k

[nsfw] [gender neutral reader]

[warnings; sex toys, dom! vik my beloved, written by a sex neutral asexual, orgasm denial/edging, overstimulation?, voyeurism?, implied dacryphyilia, degradation???, vik call you a slut, whore, dumbification?? idk how to spell that one how fitting, riding, slight oral, a small step up from mean viktor compared to my other fic]

a/n; umm... no notes. written in January, finished for valentines. this world will never give me viktor league for valentines. this is so half baked. im so sorry viktor nation.

studying was the worst. at least for you. you, who usually had a good sense of confidence when it came to your classes, felt like screaming into the void with every curse you knew.

nothing just seemed to be clicking in your mind. no matter how many times you went over it yourself, how you asked the teacher, how you asked some classmates. nothing worked.

but then viktor had this genius idea.

"hah... viktor.. i don't- i don't kn-know.." you gasped between words as you feel how sticky your lower half has become as you sat at your desk. you've never been more thankful to only afford a cheap chair because you just know that any leather seat would have you riding on it like it's viktor's own dick. "i don't know- the- the answer-! ngh!" your body trembles as the stupid hot red dildo stuck in you vibrated gently. it was enough to feel but not enough to satisfy. it wasn't even big enough to hit any good spots, too.

"dear.. you can do better than this. i don't date a dumb whore.. do i?" he said sitting on your bed as he fiddled and twisted with the setting on your vibrator. his smirk is subtle every time he gains a whine out of you when he turns the settings higher or lower.

you shook your head, intensely disagreeing with him as you try to hold back from touching yourself. "n-no.. i'm not dumb.." you whined into your hand that did nothing to cover your moans.

"we have 5 more questions, pretty. can you do them for me?" he asked. you can hear him stand up, and you see his figure at your vanity mirror as he approaches you. you can see how hard he is with his pants tightening by his dick. "i'd be very happy if i could give you a reward."

you look at your written notes, but everything seems to blur and mesh together. you shift in your seat, and the vibrator just grazes your sweet spot. you crumble and whine loudly at the absolute lack of satisfaction you just felt. so close but so far. you don't even realize you're crying.

"is my poor love too much of a dumb slut to handle some math assignments? you can't even think, right? you can't even answer my questions anymore.." he said, his hand resting on your cheek as he turns you to face him. "what will i ever do with you?" he turns the settings higher, leaving your legs twitching and shaking for more.

"v-viktor.. please.." you cried out. "i want- want you so b-badly.." you can't help your hand traveling down to your heated area to start touching yourself for any sense of satisfaction. but viktor stops you from doing too much.

"now, now, what did i say about touching yourself? i should teach you how to behave properly. i'd say i could fuck you stupid but that wouldn't be so right for this scenario, would it?"

you start getting desperate, your hands grip at his pants tugging at them and looking up at him with glazed eyes for a chance to have him in you. "v-vik- ah.. please.." your body is only turned to him now, your face covered in tears as the vibrator is only grazing and brushing at your sweet spot.

"my pretty dumb slut, is that what you are now?" he asked, holding your face by your chin. his thumb rubs at your tears. "you listen to me so well, and yet you can't even finish reviewing your notes as i told you to." he shook his head in feign disappointment before moving back to the bed. you follow him, your bodily fluids drip down your legs in a way that makes you feel so pathetic, but you don't even care at this point. you need him so bad.

"please- viktor- i want to- i want-" you can't even speak right. not when he's unbuckling his belt and unzipping his pants. you almost drool at the sight of him.

"you should be good enough to not cum until i tell you, yes?" you nodded eagerly at his words. "look at you, you're drooling over me." he commented, but most of your sense is thrown out the window as you start licking at his dick. your warm mouth starts to suck and hollow your cheeks as you blow him. you can see how much he enjoys it, but he stops you from doing too much. he grabs a condom to put on, and your body shivers in excitement.

you both move to a more comfortable position, resting fully on the bed rather than on the edge of it. he takes the vibrator out of you, leaving you whining from the emptiness. "no whining, dear." he said as he sat on the bed, pants tossed to the side, boxers somewhere on the floor, and his white button-up open and loose. "ride." he gives the one command, and you go for it. you keep it careful so as not to disturb his hurt leg too much.

you line yourself with his cock and slowly sink, moaning at him filling you so well. you start riding not long after once you get used to the feeling of him. but you're so close to cumming due to the vibrator simply torturing you earlier that your body shivers and shakes from you holding back. "let- let me cum, v-viktor!" you gasp between pumps. his hands on your hips guide the pace.

"you couldn't even answer 5 questions for your notes. are you sure you're not my dumb slut? you can't even think about anything but my cock, right now? nothing but my pretty whore."

"please, please, please!" you repeated, your eyes unfocused and blown out as your mind draws blanks. "wanna cum! please!"

"you're asking so nicely. perhaps you're not that dumb." he hummed. "you can cum now, dear." he purred before holding your face to his, to kiss you stupid. you instinctively respond to his kisses and the last thrust that hits your sweet spot, leaving you to moan his name out. "that wasn't a great plan, but we learned a lot, didn't we?" you would be mad at him for being so composed and calm this whole time if you weren't so fuzzy brained right now. he slowly guides you to pull out and tosses the condom in the nearby trash bin. you move slowly and lean down to finish him off.

"you don't have to do that, dear."

your response is muffled, and you don't even pull away. you refuse to leave your man unsatisfied, but his next words have you pausing, "jayce can do that for you. isn't that right, jayce?" you pause to look over at the door and see a heaving jayce with a hard rock cock stuffed in his pants and a guilty puppy look on his warm face.

#league of legends x reader #viktor x reader #league of legends viktor x reader #arcane viktor x reader #lol viktor #league of legends viktor #viktor league of legends #viktor arcane #arcane x reader #lol arcane

136 notes · View notes

scary-grace · 6 months ago

Text

if my heart was a house - a shigaraki x f!reader fic

It's been nineteen years since Tomura was sentenced to death, and you've built a life in the space he left behind, braced each day for the worst. You're prepared for everything - the questions your daughter asks, the memories that sting a little more in the winter, the specter of the news you've been afraid of for years. But of all the things life's thrown your way, it's the one you haven't dared to hope for might be the one thing you can't handle. (cross-posted to Ao3) The prequel can be found here: what I can't remember now written for @pixelcafe-network's Challenge Friday event! Banner/divider by @cafekitsune

Chapter 1 Chapter 2

Chapter 1

You know even before you open your eyes that it’s snowed overnight. The world always sounds too quiet afterwards, and you used to have so many words to describe it – almost comforting, almost eerie, almost serene. But that was when you were young. Now you’d replace all those words with a different one: Empty. You used to love the winter, the first snowfall of the year, and you still do. But it always reminds you of him. And he’s gone.

He’s been gone for years now. The length of time you spent with him has been swallowed six times over by the time you’ve spent alone, and you’d like to think that even in the beginning, you wore your sadness well. Now, nineteen years in, it barely shows. You keep it buried through spring, summer, autumn – until the first frost, the first freezing rain, the first icicles on the eaves and the first drifts of snow on the ground, when it crawls free of the grave and sprawls on top of you at night. You met Tomura in the winter. Fell in love with him by spring. You got two more winters with him after that, and then he was gone, and nothing can fill the space he left behind.

But even if one chamber of your heart is frozen open for good, the rest is still alive. And there’s room for a different kind of love, a way for you to translate your grief rather than buckle beneath its weight. There’s a knock at the door to your room, and your daughter’s voice slips cautiously in. “Mom? Are you awake?”

“I’m awake,” you say, and you blink away the tears. “Come in.”

Even at eighteen, Chihiro still hesitates before she steps across the threshold, but once she’s made the choice, she throws herself onto the bed with abandon. “We got half a meter. That’s even more than the forecast said.”

“And we’ve still got power. Lucky us.” You wipe your eyes, just in case, and turn to face her. “Good morning, kiddo.”

“How long do I have to be kiddo? I’m almost done with high school.”

“Okay, you’re right,” you compromise, even as your throat tightens. She’s never met her father, never will, but the tone in her voice when she’s putting her foot down reminds you painfully of him. “What should I call you instead?”

“My name. You’re the one who picked it out.” Chihiro’s dressed in her pajamas with a hoodie thrown over them, and you can see her phone lighting up through the front pocket. “Don’t you like it anymore?”

“I love it,” you say, “Chihiro. Did you sleep okay?”

She nods. There’s something on her mind. You can tell by the way her brow furrows, and the way her mouth thins tells you that she’s planning to keep it quiet. Or that she’ll try. Chihiro has a hard time keeping her feelings inside. She and Tomura have that in common, but while you always gave Tomura space to figure out how to say what he needed to, you always let Chihiro know you’re aware, and listening. “What’s going on up there, Chihiro, my daughter who’s almost done with high school?”

She rolls her eyes, but a smile is pulling up the corner of her mouth. Her smile’s always been a little lopsided, but so has yours. “There’s only one morning of the year you ever sleep in,” she says. “The first time it snows. And then you’re different all day – not mad or depressed or anything. Just different. I was wondering why.”

“I’m sorry,” you say at once. “I’m not upset with you. It’s not anything you did. You could never do anything that would –”

“I know, Mom.” Chihiro’s crimson eyes are intent on your face. “It’s one day. You get to be weird if you need to. I just wanted to know – is it because of him? My dad?”

When she was little, you’d lie, and tell her the snow is so pretty that you can’t help but get emotional about it. There was a while where she didn’t ask. But she’s old enough now that you can admit it. You think. “Yeah,” you say. Your voice is steady. You’re proud of that. “This is around the time of year when I first met him. It brings back memories.”

“Good ones?” Chihiro settles into the pillows the way she used to when she wanted a bedtime story. “Tell me.”

You hesitate. “Not the gross stuff,” Chihiro clarifies. “I don’t want to know about that. Kaori’s mom tells her all about that stuff. And she bought her a vibrator for her birthday.”

“Huh,” you say after a second. “That’s sex-positive of her.”

“You’re being nice. What do you really think?”

You think she reminds you of Tomura. He never let you duck behind the niceties; he always wanted to know your real reaction. “I think it’s weird. Especially if Kaori didn’t ask.”

“She definitely didn’t. She’s really shy.” Chihiro grimaces. “I’m glad you’re not weird like that.”

Not weird is a good thing. Maybe. “You know I’m here if you need to talk about –”

“No, Mom. Gross.” Chihiro buries her face in the pillow. “Tell me about my dad.”

“Okay,” you say. “Your dad. He, um – there was something about him. I never met someone like him before, and I haven’t since. He told the truth about stuff, even if it wasn’t pretty, and he said what he thought even if it was a bad time. One time we went on a double date with one of his friends and their new boyfriend, and the first question out of your dad’s mouth was whether the boyfriend had drawn his facial hair on.”

Chihiro wheezes. “That’s awful,” she says, but she’s laughing – just like you were. “Had he, though?”

“We never got an answer,” you say, and Chihiro laughs harder. “Your dad could be a jackass sometimes, even to people he liked, but when it really mattered, he’d –”

Kill for them. You swallow the words. “He was there for people when they needed him,” you say instead. “He was always there for me. Even if he didn’t know the right thing to say, I could count on him to listen. And he never gave me a hard time for standing up for myself. Not even when we argued about things.”

You were sort of a pushover early on. You were worried that saying no would make you difficult, and being difficult would make him want to leave. It wasn’t how you were most of the time, or how you’d been before you and Tomura got together, and he wasn’t scared to call you out. You remember the grin on his face the first time you really put your foot down about something, set a boundary and held it. I knew you were in there somewhere, he said. This is how I like you.

That was something you loved about being with Tomura: You were good for each other. You made each other better. “It sounds like you were happy,” Chihiro ventures, and you nod. “Do you think you’d have gotten married sometime? Did you guys want kids?”

Married, maybe. Your friends and his all used to joke that the two of you were the old married couple of the group, but while you talked about the future, you almost never talked about marriage to go with it. Not until it was almost the end, and you never made it to the discussion, any discussion, about having kids. Your pregnancy was catastrophic because of what happened before it, but even if it hadn’t been, it would have raised a lot of questions that neither you nor Tomura knew how to answer. “We were really young,” you say. “I was only twenty-two. We hadn’t had that talk yet. But I think we’d have talked about it if –”

“Yeah.” Chihiro’s voice is muffled by the pillows. “Did he know about me? Before he died?”

Your stomach clenches in a tight, guilty cramp, one that’s been getting steadily worse over the years. “I didn’t find out until after he was gone.”

“Oh.” Chihiro’s voice goes small and wavering. “Do you think – um – do you think he would have liked me?”

There’s no way to know. That means what you say next isn’t technically a lie. “He would have loved you,” you say. Her shoulders shake, and you rest your hand on her back to settle her, the same as you’ve done since she was a baby. “Just like I do.”

Chihiro turns her head to look at you, her eyes glassy with tears. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s okay. Everything’s okay.” You rub her back in slow circles. “Ask about him whenever you want. I’ll always try to answer.”

“Do you miss him?”

Other than your daughter’s ragged breathing and your own steady, shallow sips of air, there’s no sound in the world. When you open up the blinds, you’ll see an empty snowfield, unmarked by human footprints for a little while longer. Footprints in the snow will be filled in by the next storm or melted away in the thaw, but the marks Tomura left on you are indelible. There will never be room for someone else where he stood, because he’s still standing there, somewhere you can’t reach.

Sometimes you’ve thought, selfishly, that it would be easier if he really was dead, just so you wouldn’t have to cope with knowing that he’s still out there, knowing exactly where he is with no way to get to him. You’ve let Chihiro think he’s dead. You tell yourself it’s easier for her this way. It’s better that she doesn’t know what really happened to Tomura. The fact that you know is bad enough.

“Mom?” Chihiro asks, and you realize you never answered her question. “Do you still miss my dad?”

You still love him. That’s the same thing. “I do,” you say. “Every day.”

Chihiro cries herself out, and then it’s time to get moving. Her school has a late start, not a snow day, and you still have to go to work. You make a special breakfast anyway, play the music you and she used to dance to when she was little, and soon your daughter’s smiling again. Chihiro doesn’t have trouble being happy, not like you and Tomura both did. Still do, probably. Your depression was just that, but the sheer weight of Tomura’s past regularly threatened to crush him, and you doubt the nineteen years he’s already spent in prison have done anything to improve things.

But Chihiro knows how to be happy, and you know, because she tells you when she’s not. You’re not naive enough to think your teenager tells you everything, but she knows she can talk to you. And she does talk to you, getting steadily back to herself as you eat breakfast and clean up and get ready, her for school, you for work. Then the two of you crunch your way to the car and start digging it out of the snow. The snowplows must have been out last night and early this morning, because the road doesn’t have much in the way of accumulation. You’ll have to be careful of ice.

You’re both a little sweaty under your winter coats when you get in the car at last. “I’m already gross,” Chihiro complains. “Why can’t we get a garage or something?”

“Where would we put it?”

“In your room,” Chihiro says. You snort. “Or in mine. Since I’m going to uni soon.”

Your heart sinks whenever she says that, but you’ll be damned before you let it show. “You’ll still need somewhere to stay when you come back,” you say. “Maybe we don’t really need a kitchen.”

Chihiro rolls her eyes. “What? You’re not planning to turn my room into, like, a sewing room or something once I go to school?”

"No," you say. "My parents did that when I went away. I hated it."

Looking back, you took it way too personally. They weren’t saying they were done with you, or that the place you’d grown up wasn’t home anymore. You were just hurting, and looking desperately for a reason why. Coming back on school break to find your room cleaned out was a good one. “I’m not going to do that,” you say to Chihiro.“Even when you live somewhere else, you’ll always have a place with me.”

Chihiro glances sideways at you. “Kaori’s mom is freaking about her moving away.”

“Kaori’s mom freaks out a lot,” you say. You and she should have bonded, because you’re the only single moms in this small town, but Kaori’s mom makes you nervous. “How does Kaori feel about it?”

“Her mom will be fine. She’s not worried.” Chihiro pauses for a long moment. “I am, though.”

Your grip on the steering wheel goes white-knuckled. “About Kaori’s mom?”

“About you,” Chihiro says. You reach a stop sign, come to a full stop, and turn to look at her. There’s a stubborn set to her jaw that’s all too familiar. “Kaori’s mom is crazy. But Kaori’s mom has a life. She goes out some nights and her friends come to visit and she has parties and hobbies —“

“I have hobbies,” you protest.

“Yeah. Your hobby means you hang out in the house all day,” Chihiro says. “You can't carry your sewing machine and all your fabric to a craft party. Maybe if you learned to knit or something —“

“I’m not going to knit.”

“Something,” Chihiro says firmly. “Something that means you’re not alone all the time. I’m excited to go to uni. I’m worried about what’s going to happen to you when I leave.”

You’ve fucked up, big-time. “Chihiro, I understand why you —“ No, you don’t. All you understand is that you were stupid to think your damage didn’t show, awful for making Chihiro think she has any responsibility for your mess of an internal life at all. “It’s not your job to make sure I’m okay. I can take care of myself.”

“It’s not about taking care of yourself,” Chihiro fires back. “It’s about being happy. You want me to be happy, right?”

“Of course I do,” you say. “I love you.”

“I love you, Mom.” Chihiro says it bluntly, unashamedly. “So I want you to be happy, too.”

You don’t know what to say. It’s quiet, and it keeps being quiet, until a car pulls up behind you and honks its horn. You refocus on driving in a hurry. With you distracted, Chihiro pushes the point. “You barely even talk to people, Mom. Kaori’s mom thinks you hate her because you never say yes when she asks to hang out.”

“I don’t hate her,” you say. Chihiro’s skeptical look skewers you to the seat. “Look, she’s just not — it’s complicated.”

“No it’s not,” Chihiro says. “Next time she asks to hang out, say yes.”

No. “What if I sign up for an art class at the community center instead?”

“Do that, too,” Chihiro says. You grimace. “You want me to be happy. I’ll be happy if I know you’re talking to other people and doing stuff that’s not in the house. I don’t want to come back on a school break and find out you’ve only been talking to the trees or something.”

She pauses. “I guess you can talk to them a little. As long as you don’t start thinking they talk back.”

“Got it.”

You drop Chihiro off at school less than a minute before the bell rings, but she still makes you get out of the car and hug her. She hugs really tight. She got that from you. Tomura used to complain jokingly that you were a boa constrictor in a girlfriend suit. You kiss her forehead and send her on her way, then get back in the car and drive to work, feeling even worse than you did when you opened your eyes to a snowy silence this morning.

Chihiro’s wrong about Kaori’s mom. It is complicated — not because you hate her, but because she’s the nosiest person in town, and because you’ve got a lot to hide. You didn’t mean to have a lot to hide. It was just something that happened, and as the years since Tomura’s conviction have unfolded, you’ve gotten steadily more attached to the lie. It’s not about you. It’s about Chihiro, who shouldn’t have to live with the knowledge that her father’s a convicted murderer awaiting execution in supermax prison, who shouldn’t have to deal with people looking at her differently. It’s about Chihiro. It’s not about you.

Or so you tell yourself. But there’s a reason you fled from Tokyo in the aftermath of Tomura’s sentencing, why you cut off contact with his friends and yours, why you dyed your hair and changed your phone number and nuked your social media along with every email address you ever had. People hated Tomura. And because you were with him, they hated you, too. It didn’t matter that you knew nothing. That the murders he was accused of committing took place before you met him. Even if you’d dumped him the second he was arrested, you’d have been called stupid for not seeing it all along. You couldn’t hack it. You were headed for a breakdown at high speed. But you would have stayed, if Tomura hadn’t told you to go.

The last time you spoke to him was after his sentencing, as they were taking him away. You seized his hands, already cuffed, his wrists chafed raw, and for a split second, he held on so tightly that one of your fingers broke. Then he looked up, hopeless fury in his eyes. Get out of here. Don’t come back. I don’t want you to watch.

You thought he meant he didn’t want you to watch him being shoved into an armored truck for transport, but when your letters came back unopened, when he refused to let you visit or even call him, you realized the truth. He wanted you gone, just as completely as he was gone from you. That moment in the courtroom was the last one you’d ever have with him. And that was what tripped the breakdown at last. You were throwing up too much to overdose and you were too chicken to try another way, so you went to the doctor to figure it out so you could kill yourself with your chosen method. You just wanted anti-nausea pills. The doctor did bloodwork, made you give a urine sample, and gave you a diagnosis.

“Hyperemesis gravidarum,” he said, and you looked at him blankly. “You’re pregnant.”

He expected you to get an abortion. Everybody and their mother probably expected you to get an abortion. If Tomura had been there, if your accidental pregnancy had been something the two of you were dealing with together, it probably wouldn’t have even been a question. And for any other pregnancy, it would have been the only viable option in your mind. But when you thought about it, about this pregnancy, your mind rejected the idea so violently that you threw up again. You couldn’t get rid of this baby. You needed it. Looking back, you know your reasons were terrible. You had a kid so you wouldn’t be alone. So you’d keep some memory of Tomura close to you always. So you’d have a reason to keep getting up in the morning, a reason to eat and sleep and exercise, a reason to find a new job in your new town and work hard at it. So someone would need you. So you could do something with your agony at losing Tomura, grab it with both hands and twist it back into love. Deciding to have the baby was the most selfish thing you’ve ever done. And raising Chihiro, loving her, is the most important thing you’ll ever do.

She’s right about you. You do live for her. And if that means signing up for a pottery class at the community center and agreeing to grab tea with Kaori’s crazy mom so she won’t worry, that’s what you’ll do.

You work in the combined billing/records/HR department at your town’s medical clinic, with occasional ventures to the front desk when a receptionist is out sick. You spend a lot of time staring at the computer, a lot of time on the phone, and very little time talking to your coworkers — but you’ve been here for seventeen years, longer than almost anyone else. You were working here before some of your coworkers were out of primary school.

Dr. Kawada is your age, though. He greets you as you walk in. “Glad you made it. Anybody who lives past the town limits is staying home.”

“They should. The roads are terrible even with the plows out.” You hang up your coat, then sit down and power up your computer. “How many patients do you think we’ll get?”

“We have a ton of cancelations already,” Keiko, the nurse-practitioner, reports. She would be the one to make it in — Kawada would crawl here with his teeth if he had to, and she’s his wife, so of course she tagged along. “And there was a call for you, bright and early.”

“For billing? Somebody must have been losing sleep.”

“Not for billing. For you,” Keiko admonishes. “I forwarded it to your phone. It seemed kind of urgent.”

You log into your computer, then decide to check the message while you’re waiting for it to perk up. The voice on the other end of the line is completely unfamiliar. “Hi there. My name is Midoriya Izuku, and I’m a lawyer with the —" There’s a really loud sound on the other end of the line, completely obliterating whatever he was about to tell you about the organization he’s part of. “Due to confidentiality I can’t share much over the phone, but it’s really important that I get in touch with you! Please call me back to arrange a meeting —“

You hang up and delete the message. You don’t like lawyers, and this guy sounds like he has prosecutor written all over him. Or else he’s a reporter lying to you about his credentials to trick you into giving him a quote. The twenty-year anniversary of Tomura’s conviction is coming up, and there were articles at the ten-year mark, too. You’re more concerned about how this Midoriya Izuku got your number in the first place. You’re not easy to find. You made yourself tough to find on purpose.

It’s a quiet day at the office. Almost all the appointments are canceled, which means that the walk-ins get seen almost immediately, and you have time to start on your end-of-the-year reports. And time to talk, because Keiko and Dr. Kawada are in talkative moods, and you’re the best and only target. “How’s Chihiro?” Keiko asks. “Has she picked a school?”

“Not yet. Still weighing her options,” you say. And then, because you’re tired: “She’s worried about what will happen to me once she leaves.”

“Tell her not to worry. We’ll take care of you!” Dr. Kawada says with a grin. “What’s she worried about, anyway? You seem fine.”

“I am fine. But I’m signing up for an art class so she’ll stop worrying that I’m going to wither away alone,” you say. Dr. Kawada snorts. “How I’m doing isn’t her responsibility. She didn’t ask to be born and I didn’t have her so she could take care of me.”

“Nobody thinks that,” Keiko says. She gives you a weird look, but then she changes the subject. “Hey, but even once she moves out, you don’t have to be alone! Me and Shogo know lots of people we want to set you up with!”

You’re pretty sure your face goes dead white. “What?”

“I mean, I know you haven’t been seeing anyone since you moved here —"

“Because it’s not about me anymore. It’s about Chihiro.”

“Yeah, but if it’s about Chihiro, shouldn’t you want her not to worry?” Kawada’s not helping. You feel like you might be sick. “I moved here right around when you did and I’ve never seen you date anybody. Things must have gone down real bad with your ex —"

“Shogo!” Keiko swats him, mortified, then looks at you. “Sorry. He should know better.”

“Chihiro’s dad isn’t my ex,” you say. “He’s — gone.”

It’s the same trick you’ve been pulling on Chihiro since she was old enough to ask, and it works on adults, too. Kawada backs off, chagrined. “Sorry,” he says. There’s an awkward silence. “I’ve known you for seventeen years. How did I miss that?”

“I don’t like to talk about it.” You don’t even like thinking about Tomura, but every winter, it’s unavoidable. Every winter the sadness curls up around you, and although time is supposed to heal things, it’s never gotten any easier to throw off come spring. “I wouldn’t wish it on anybody.”

“Yeah,” Keiko agrees. Her eyes are sad. “Still. Tell Chihiro not to worry. We’ll keep an eye on you.”

You force a smile, force your eyes to brighten. “Thank you.”

It’s the clinic’s slowest day in a while, and you spend a lot of it screwing around on the computer. You sign up for an art class, one that meets the same night as Chihiro’s choir practice, so you can pick her up on the way home. You google therapists, too — maybe she’ll feel better if she knows you have one. And maybe you need one. Chihiro’s your daughter, the most important person in the world, the one you’d sacrifice everything to care for. Caring for her takes up most of your thoughts, distracts you from the pain of losing Tomura. Once Chihiro goes away for school, there won’t be anything left to keep your sadness at bay.

Tomura’s been on death row for nineteen years. They could execute him at any time, and you’d never know until his name was released by the government. During his trial, when you realized the death penalty was on the table, you looked up how it would happen. It still haunts you sometimes. You don’t want to think of Tomura with his neck broken, his eyes open and staring, dying with feet chained together and his hands bound behind his back. You want to remember him before it all went wrong. Back when you still believed he was the best thing that ever happened to you.

You met him at university, on a day when the campus was iced over. Your on-campus job started early, which meant you had to make your way to the library on paths that wouldn’t be de-iced for another hour. Tomura had an early class. He was headed the opposite way from you, and you were both so focused on not slipping and falling that you walked headlong into each other and fell on your asses anyway.

Your backpack slid from your shoulders, and the papers Tomura was carrying scattered across the path. Fuck, Tomura said, with feeling, and you laughed. What’s so funny? You fell down, too.

I know, but — An image popped into your head and set you off all over again. We look like we’re in a cartoon. Except without the stars and planets around our heads.

No stars and planets? I want a refund, Tomura said, and cracked a smile that opened up a split in his lower lip. Damn it —

Here. You retrieved your fallen backpack and a packet of tissues, then started gathering the papers Tomura had dropped. Sorry. It looked like you were in a hurry to go somewhere.

Comp-Sci building. I’m never signing up for a 7am again. Tomura’s phone buzzed, and he yanked it out of his pocket. And now it’s canceled. Motherfucker. I have to walk all the way back —

Maybe not all the way, you said, and he looked at you. I work at the library. It’s definitely open. You can hang out there until they get the paths salted.

Tomura looked at you, the tissue still pressed to his bloody lip. You didn’t know his name yet, didn’t know anything about him, but there was something you liked about his face. Something you liked about how he still got in on your joke, even though he was pissed about the fall. Something about the fact that he hadn’t gotten up yet, even though you’d gathered all his papers and were holding them out for him to take. I’ll level with you, he said after a second. I’ve never been to the library.

I get that a lot, you said, and you stood up. The plan was to hold out your hand to help him up, but you moved too fast, and your feet slid out from under you again. You managed to hang on to Tomura’s papers, but you went down hard. Fuck!

Tomura didn’t ask if you were okay. He just lifted the papers out of your hands, set them aside, and helped you sit up with hands that shook ever so slightly. I’m surprised you swore, he said, and you raised an eyebrow. You look like the type who says fiddlesticks instead.

Fuck off, you said, and he laughed. Making him laugh felt like an achievement, one you were proud to win. Looking back, that was when you knew you were in trouble. Maybe we should just crawl to the library.

It’s cold. Walking’s faster. Tomura got shakily to his knees, then his feet, and you copied him. I bet we can make it.

He stumbled twice on the way there, and you stumbled once, but neither of you fell again. You were leaning on each other to balance, more contact than you ever made with guys you weren’t dating, and nothing about it felt tense or awkward. It was just the only thing that made sense to do.

And that’s how everything was with Tomura. It just made sense, and you were so happy — and you think Tomura was, too. You fought sometimes, sure, but everyone does. Sometimes you didn’t know the right thing to say, but neither did he. He had a rough past, and you didn’t push him to talk about it. You just let him share what he wanted to, when he wanted to, and towards the end you had something close to the whole picture. It just didn’t have the murders in it.

No. You don’t want to think about this. You know what you believe about this, and going in a circle won’t help solve anything. You decide to redirect your feelings of frustration by looking up the lawyer who called you. Sure enough, he’s a prosecutor— or he was. Looking at the profile on his law firm’s website, you’re not sure what he does. He was in the news a year or so ago. Some case involving the yakuza.

The bell rings, and since Keiko’s on break and the receptionist got snowed in, you hurry up to the front to check the new patient in. It’s a good distraction. It helps to stay busy. When you’re busy, you don’t have to think about any of it — not Tomura, not the fact that he’s gone, not the fact that your daughter is leaving soon, too. And you don’t have to think about how it won’t be long before all your distractions run out.

Chapter 2 ->

#shigaraki tomura x reader #tomura shigaraki x reader #shigaraki tomura x you #tomura shigaraki x you #shigaraki x reader #shigaraki x you #reader insert #x reader #man door hand hook car door #a bisquared production

153 notes · View notes

sometimesanalice · 1 year ago

Text

Wildest Dreams

Summary: Never in your wildest dreams would you have expected to be waiting at a Naval hangar for a man you’d met two months ago during Fleet Week. Let alone one you’d only known for less than twenty-four hours. (Even if it had been the best sex of your life.)

Pairing: Bradley 'Rooster' Bradshaw x Female Reader

Length: 6k

Warning: fluff, smut, and the return of the summer dress whites (minors dni)

(author's note: this was written as part of @laracrofted's 1989(TV) challenge. It is a prequel to Hey, Sailor, but can be read on its own!)

This has the potential to be the best idea you’ve ever had or the worst.

Although based on the way you kind of want to shimmy out of your too tight skin, you’re starting to think it might be the worst.

You are out of place and out of sorts. There are kids giggling and running around with homemade posters covered in bright neon bubble letters and you aren’t even wearing a bra.

Oh god, what were you thinking?

Never in your wildest dreams would you have expected to be waiting for a man you’d only met two months ago during Fleet Week. Let alone one that you had known for less than twenty-four hours and had sex with within the first two hours of meeting. But you couldn’t think about that too much without your face heating up.

And waiting at Naval Air Station North Island, no less.

Oh, this was a very bad idea.

The happy chatter of excited friends and family of the deployed squadron members, who are due to return within the hour, is bouncing off of the cavernous curved walls of the hangar you’re standing in. Bursts of delighted laughter rippling throughout the space.

And with each passing minute the thumping of your heart pounds a little harder against the walls of your chest. Whether it’s anticipation or apprehension you couldn’t say.

Under normal circumstances the energy would be infectious, the atmosphere around you is bubbly and light, but all it does is make you feel like it is glaringly obvious that you don’t fit in here with the rest of the clusters of families.

That is if your nice yet slightly-too-revealing-to-be-family-friendly dress didn’t already give you away.

The only perk of it at the moment was that the breeze against the bare skin of your exposed back was keeping you from breaking out in an anxious full body sweat in the summer heat.

In your defense, you’d picked this dress out for a reason and had chosen it with a purpose in mind. Even if you were second guessing every decision that has led you here.

Over the last two months, you had changed your mind more frequently than the wind changed direction.

He’d been brought into your life on a high tide of champagne bubbles that had swiftly taken him right back out, leaving a wake of nothing but champagne problems.

Every time you thought about recycling the packet of papers that had taunted you and tempted you in equal parts, you were reminded of the warm brown eyes of the person who had given it to you. And it never failed to set your heart a flutter the same way had when he’d given it to you with that soft, cautiously hopeful smile.

You have the registration form that had gotten you through the heavily secured gate clutched tightly in your hand as if you’re waiting for some uniformed security official to come up to question you then escort you off the base.

Although now it’s so crumbled and creased that you don’t know if they’d even be able to read it.

Worst of all, you had no way to distract your busy mind from all your buzzing thoughts.

They’d taken your phone at the gate, a security measure they’d told you as you watched them tag it with your name and put in a slim cubby for you to collect when you left.

Which might be sooner than you thought, because the longer you stand there waiting and shifting on your feet the more you were fighting the urge to backpedal. To spin on your strappy sandaled feet and hightail it back to your car and drive the legally posted limit only until you made it past those intimidating chain link gates before flooring it, getting as far away from this cheery, happy hanger as quickly as possible.

And yet for whatever reason, your antsy feet and tapping toes stay planted on shiny finish of the industrial cement of the hanger.

This is crazy.

You’d thought it as you slipped on and tied the flimsy straps of your pink ruffled sundress and collected all of your things. Pausing to double check that you had your Driver’s License, Passport, and Social Security card in your purse for the fourth time that day.

This is ridiculous.

You’d thought it as you’d drove along the highway to the Naval base that you had only been to only once a couple of months ago. The sun beaming down on your car with hardly a cloud in the sky. A perfect golden California day, even if your mind was in a hazy fog.

This is foolish.

You’d definitely thought that on loop, like a broken record in your mind, as you’d waited in the long line of cars all done up in window paints and streamers packed with grinning, eager faces all queued up for the same reason.

When you had finally made it to the front of the line, your heart had been pounding away beating a mile a minute. Your palms sweating as you handed over the three-page packet and identification cards to the security working the gates.

The Use of Deadly Force Authorized sign was a stark contrast with the smiles of the officials who greeted you.

You were positive you looked as shifty as you felt. But it seemed the only person who thought you looked like a red flag was you. Because they’d barely given you a second glace as they’d waved you through after checking your paperwork. You had almost blurted out Are you sure?, but managed to keep it together as you waited for the red arms of the barrier gate to lift.

That final hurdle officially out of your hands because you were finally there and soon he’d be here.

During one white wine fueled late night evening on your couch you’d allowed yourself to indulge in those tempting taunting what-ifs.

What-if you went.

What-if you waited.

What-if you met him there.

And in your casual research somewhere between the third and fourth glass of Sauvignon Blanc, before you had scrolled back three years on the base’s official Instagram page and googled the sure-to-be redacted version of the visitor’s map of the base, you’d read that sometimes they’d direct visitors to park in a lot on the edge of the base to be shuttled to the designated homecoming hanger.

Thankfully, there would be no shuttles operating on military efficient timetables for you. Since you’d been directed to a parking lot that sat across from a large hanger decorated with waving and winking banners of bold red, white, and blues.

You couldn’t help release a little sigh of relief knowing that you’d be able to make an easy escape if you needed to.

Because if this was going to take you down, if the sun was going to set on your gleaming gilded what-ifs, at least you could leave with your head held high. Even if your tail would be between your legs.

Just in case, you had built it up in your head.

Just in case, he changed his mind.

Because this was crazy, this was ridiculous, this was foolish. But you didn’t want those memories from two months ago to follow you around like a ghost of what could have been.

You wanted to see what it could be. What you hoped it might become.

You’ve thought about that night a lot.

Flashes of sturdy white twill and toned muscles and a low, raspy voice had kept you up more nights than you were willing to acknowledge. You’d lost time thinking about warm hands and a rich laugh and lips that left hot trails along your body that you still felt like a ley line under your skin.

After the mark beneath your ear had faded, the only proof it all hadn’t been some gold rush dream was the flimsy piece of paper currently grasped in your hand like a lifeline.

Before that night you’d never understood the draw of Fleet Week. It seemed like the type of mess you’d purposely avoided. Nights that left you either with a good story to tell over brunch or in mascara coated tears crumpled like a piece of paper on the ground.

But now, you didn’t think you’d ever be able to think of it without thinking of it and him with only the rosiest of memories.

Your mind wanders as you remember the way he’d made you felt. Of being around him, of tangled up with him. You’re too busy thinking about heated smiles and pretty scars that the sound sneaks up on you.

It starts out as a low rumble that swiftly builds into a roar that shakes you out of that shimmering lavender haze. Cheers break out in the crowd as people flood out of the hanger and onto the tarmac to get a better view.

Looking around you, there are kids pressing their hands to their ears as the squeal and shout in delight. Their faces turning up to the skies as they enthusiastically wave at the aircrafts flying towards the base with perfect precision.

You get as close to the edge of the hanger as you dare. Toeing the line between cracked industrial cement and sundrenched asphalt, still unsure your place in all of this. Not quite ready to fully give yourself up to the swift current of honey hued possibility.

There are at least a dozen jets approaching in sharp triangular and diamond shaped formations. Clusters of four flying in flawless alignment with one another, their shiny bodies stand out in relief against the cloudless blue skies. It’s a gravity defying ballet as the individual groups merge together in impeccable unison to form one large unit.

Your jaw drops open in awe and your heart soars into your throat at the stunningly impressive sight.

They speed impossibly fast overhead and within seconds all that remains are the contrails of their coming and the knowledge that soon they’ll have their feet back on the ground with the rest of you.

The low, thick whomp whomp whomp of large helicopter propellers approaching behind them in the distance like an echo as more and more of the deployed squadron arrive for their homecoming.

You almost can’t hear it over the steady drumbeat of your heartbeat in your ears.

Because he’s back. He’s here.

After two months of wondering and waiting, you’re about to find out.

It’s all happening now.

“It’s her last fling before the ring! Cheers, bitches!”

You didn’t know whether you were impressed or one enthusiastic woo! away from losing it at the amount of puns Amanda, the maid of honor, had been able to come up with for the evening.

To no one’s surprise, tequila shots and champagne were a dangerous combo.

When the bride-to-be had said she wanted to keep things local and have a staycation type girl’s weekend for her bachelorette party, you and your bank account had been thrilled. It wasn’t until you all had left for the hotel all gussied up in your sparkling hot pink finest to head out for dinner that you noticed all the white uniforms dotting the sidewalks and seated out on some of the outdoor terraces.

It was Fleet Week.

You’ve lived in San Diego for almost five years now. And while running into someone in the Navy was commonplace, in both the grocery store and on the dating apps you’d redownloaded a few months ago, Fleet Week was something that you’d always purposely avoided. Opting to stay home and out of the fray.

However, you were coming off of a break up with a man who had slowly sucked all the color from your world. And this weekend was just the thing you needed to let go, to be unabashedly uninhibited, to reclaim your shimmer.

Your shiny pink dress is three inches shorter and your heels two inches taller than anything you’d ever worn before. There had been a brief moment when you’d felt self-conscious stepping into the lobby of the hotel, aware of just how much skin was on display with short hem and the low dip of the back of your dress, until your best friend had given you the loudest wolf-whistle known to mankind sending you into a fit of giggles.

And instead of shying away from the eyes that had been drawn to you in that moment, you sparkled.

You didn’t quite feel like your old self yet, but you were on your way. You liked this version of yourself so much better than the shell of a girl you’d been before. You liked the one who could be bold and brave and bejeweled.

The upscale bar is packed and it’s just the kind of lively atmosphere where tonight’s bad decisions could become tomorrow’s good stories.

It felt less like a club and more like a large stylish living room, with its cozy clusters of oversized chairs and couches. Pockets of the room were cast in a soft lavender light, while the rest was awash in a golden glow from the massive modern chandelier that ran the length of the room. Gleaming brass accents were offset with the warm tones of the wooden paneling that lined the walls. It was soft, lush, and inviting.

The music was good and there was even a small dancefloor, but it wasn’t so loud that you couldn’t enjoy having a conversation with someone without shouting. The bar looked more like a library than a place to get your drinks with its black leather tufted base and dark wooden built-ins displaying shiny bottles like a prized book collection. And the cocktails were stellar.

It was obvious why so many people had ended up here tonight, both civilians and Naval personnel on leave.

“Oh, hello there,” you hear your best friend practically purr, pulling you from your internal debate about another ordering another shot of tequila.

You look over to see her staring at the door where two tall officers have just entered with a devious gleam in her eyes.

The one on the left was just her type, a pretty boy with the kind of megawatt smile that would have orthodontists dying to get a closer look. He looked the cocky kind of confident now, but you knew if your friend made her move she’d have him wrapped around her finger before the bartenders even announce last call.

The man next to him was the taller one of the two and sporting a mustache that might have looked ridiculous on anyone else, but for whatever reason it suited him very well. Especially when it was paired with that easy grin he was currently wearing as he laughed along with something his friend was saying. Even from across the room you could tell he’d be even more attractive up close.

Their tans and the definition of their arms were offset by the crisp whites of their short-sleeved uniforms. And looking at them you could finally understand the appeal of Fleet Week.

Men like that could easily make a girl lose her mind amongst other things.

You had no doubt in your mind that these two in particular would be a hot commodity tonight. There were already quite a few heads turned in their direction to watch as they made their way towards the bar. Appreciative eyes glinting as they take in just how well they both filled out their uniforms.

Another loud woo! from your group of friends pulls your attention back to them in time to see another bottle of champagne, complete with a bright sparkler, being delivered to the table you had all chipped in for the evening.

At this rate, someone was either going to end up on top of a table or on the confetti covered floor.

You chance another look back over your shoulder towards the two men who’d just saddled up to the bar and are met with a pair of mischievous eyes already trained on you.

An electric touch races up along your spine.

You’re still a safe distance far enough away to where you can allow yourself to take him in, fighting the urge to hastily look away and pretend it was an accident that your eyes connected when you had definitely been trying to sneak another peek at them- at him in particular. You see his smile pull to the left and his cheek tick up as you hold his gaze.

He’s less than subtle in the way he lets his eyes drag over the exposed skin of your back and down the line of your legs before letting them settle back on your face. When you shoot him a pointed raise of your eyebrow, that smirk on his face just grows even wider.

It makes your stomach swoop, and even worse, it makes your own lips turn up in an amused smile in response.

An unabashed flirt.

There’s no doubt in your mind he knows exactly what he is doing. You’re sure he has practiced this kind of silent conversation many times. That over the years he has polished his technique to a shiny, smooth finish.

You know nothing good can come from a man in a uniform, but a man in uniform during Fleet Week is a different kind of trouble altogether.

And one who looks like that? Big and broad, with confidence rolling off of him in waves?

No, nothing good could come from it.

Taking one more sweep of his face you turn away from him and opt to sip on some cold water instead.

Your best friend is still making eyes with the man with the dimples, so you start up a conversation with one of the other bridesmaids you don’t know as well as some of the others. She was a sweetheart, but you could tell this wasn’t her usual scene so it felt like you were doing a lot of the heavy lifting for the conversation.

It also didn’t help that you were trying and failing to ignore the way it had felt when he looked at you, like sparks dancing across your skin that you could still feel like a phantom touch.

You’re struggling to come up with a new topic of conversation when cloud of white sequins and rhinestones and tulle bulldozes into you.

“Come get a drink with us,” the bride-to-be declares as she hooks her arm with yours and starts tugging you towards the bar.

You see that your best friend is already a couple steps ahead of the two of you and heading in the same direction to the bar, purpose in every step she takes.

“You need a break from free champagne?” you ask with a grin.

“I want something pink!” she sings.

You laugh at her dedication to the theme, “Ok, let’s get you something pink.”

“Yes, let’s,” she agrees.

As you get closer to the bar, you ignore the pull in your stomach and the gaze of the broad man who lingers in your peripheral vision. It had been heady from a distance you had no clue how you’d fair with it directed at you up close.

You’re not surprised in the least when your best friend passes by the open space at the bar and flounces right up to the officer with the dimples. And you’re even less surprised when she takes the shot that was held loosely in his hand and tosses it back in one go, before running her thumb along the bottom of her lip and giving him a sharp, feline grin. The now shot-less man rises up to the occasion and gives her a matching one of his own, the interest gleaming in his eyes.

However, you are very much shocked when your soon-to-be-wed friend all but shoves you towards the man with the mustache.

Your hands dart out to catch yourself on the bar, but one ends up on his thick forearm instead as he reaches out to steady you. His other hand is braced low on your hip, big and warm. Glancing down you can see that his pinky is very near the hem of your short dress.

You toss her a withering glare over your shoulder, but she’s already bobbling back towards the group very clearly pleased with herself.

As you turn to look up at him, all words escape you and your breath gets caught in your throat.

He’s handsome as hell.

And up close, that uniform has the potential to be even more life ruining than it was from a distance.

It is almost obscene the way it clings to the bulk of him. The sleeves of his shirt were stretched out around his biceps and pulled taut across his chest. His pants look almost molded to his thighs and long legs. It’s almost dizzying just how good-looking he is in it.

And you’re absolutely mortified.

“Hey, Sailor,” you say weakly at an attempt to diffuse the awkwardness of how you’ve come to be pressed against his hard body.

He throws his head back and laughs. It’s low and lush, rich and raspy. And god, do you like the sound of it.

But there’s still a rush anxious energy that courses through you, unsure if he’s laughing at you or the situation you’ve both been literally thrust into. You’re tempted to step back out of his reach, but his fingers tighten the gentlest bit where his hand still sits on your hip keeping you in place.

There’s amusement dancing behind his brown eyes and that smile of his up close is even more devastating. And you can’t help but shoot him a sheepish smile in return.

“That’s one way to make an entrance,” he grins.

“I am so sorry about that,” you say gesturing to the gaggle of giggling girls watching on from the corner of the room. You get your feet righted underneath you and take a half-step back.

And this time he lets you, his pinky grazing the skin of your upper thigh as he does.

“I’m not,” he says, leaning against the shiny black and white marble slab of the bar top, “I was hoping you’d come over here.”

You refuse to let yourself get flushed, but the heat races to your cheeks all the same.

Instead you pivot.

“I feel like I should warn you, she’s going to eat your friend alive,” you say, gesturing to your best friend who is looking every inch the menace you know her to be.

He glances over towards where his friend and yours are talking. His friend’s shot has been replaced and they’re both wearing a pair of dueling smiles. Their conversation too quiet to hear, but you know that tone of hers and what it means.

The good kind or the bad kind it was too early in the evening to say.

You allow yourself a brief moment to admire his profile, your eyes tracing over his cheekbones and jaw, noticing a few scars that dot his sunkissed skin.

He lets out a low chuckle and looks back towards you, “Good. Hangman has been a pain in my ass for years. Serves him right. It’ll be good for his ego.”

“Hangman?” you ask, eyebrows pinching together.

“Oh, right. That’s Jake,” he clarifies, nodding over to his friend, “Hangman is his callsign. Bagman if he’s pissing me off, which is often enough. We’re both Naval aviators.”

Well, that explained the aura of self-assuredness that radiated from the two of them from the very moment you’d seen them.

The uniform was bad enough on its own, but a pilot?

Trouble was definitely too small a word for this man, he’d need a different category created for him altogether.

“Can’t say I’m too mad at him right now though. I wanted to go somewhere more lowkey, but he said ‘pretty girls like pretty places’,” he gives you a slow smile as his eyes drift over you, “Turns out he was right. But don’t tell him that I said that, he’ll be insufferable.”

And then he has the audacity to wink at you.

You absolutely will not be getting tangled up with a pilot. But you were definitely up for a little fun, and decide there is no harm in indulging in some friendly banter.

“So are you going to tell me your callsign or do I have to guess?” you tease.

“It’s Rooster.”

You swallow down the quip that comes to your mind first, and ask instead, “Do you come with a first name, Rooster? Or did the Navy claim that too?”

He has Bradshaw emblazoned on the nametag on his chest, but you’re so curious to find out the answer. You’ve never been so interested collecting breadcrumb pieces of someone before, there’s something in the way he’s looking at you that makes you want to know more.

“I’m Bradley,” he grins wider, holding out his hand to you.

You look from him to his big hand and then back to him again, debating on how much you want to give him in return. He lifts a playful eyebrow his hand still outstretched as he waits for your move.

So you put your hand in his and give him your name.

Rooster repeats it back as if he’s testing out the way the syllables and consonants of your name feel in his mouth. And if he’s slow to let go of your hand, you let it slide without a comment.

“Well, since it’s Fleet Week and all, Bradley Rooster Bradshaw, I think would be pretty unpatriotic for me to not buy you a drink as an apology for my friends and for subjecting you that poorly executed line.”

His features take on a very contemplative look as he lets out a low, quiet hmm.

“I don’t know about that,” he deliberates.

“About the drink?” you ask, fully prepared to make a hasty retreat before you make yourself look any more ridiculous than you already did.

“No, about the line,” Rooster says, whiskey smooth, “I think it was pretty effective.”

“Really? That’s all it took, huh?” you laugh, “You must have been stuck on that ship for a while.”

Flagging down the bartender, you order a couple shots of chilled tequila.

You see Bradley reach into his shirt pocket, pulling out a few loose bills to pay. There’s definitely nowhere for a wallet to go in those pants. Sliding in front of him, letting yourself graze up against him just the slightest bit, you tell the bartender to put the shots on your group’s open tab. You can see them still spying on you, so it was the least they could do for a free show.

You spin towards him and rest your elbows on the bartop behind you with a grin. He just smirks and shakes his head at you with a look that you’d almost want to call fond if you’d actually known him for longer than ten minutes.

“So, how long were you deployed? Are you headed back to wherever home is after this weekend is over?” you ask.

“I’m actually stationed here permanently in San Diego,” Bradley says, pausing for a moment before continuing, “But I am headed out for a two-month deployment tomorrow.”

He’s looking at you closely, as if he is trying to gauge your reaction to him showing you his cards so early. Here today, but gone tomorrow.

This open honesty from him makes him even more attractive in your eyes. He’s the type of man who could so easily wreck your plans if you gave him the chance to. And for a split second, you can almost see the end before anything can even begin.

“Well, it’s nice of the city to give you such a nice send-off then,” you say lightly, ignoring the twinge in your stomach.

Thankfully, the bartender returns with the chilled shots, you thank him and then hand Bradley one of the shot glasses cheers-ing him with your own, “To Uncle Sam’s overly inflated defense budget.”

He snorts and watches as you raise the glass to your lips. Feeling bold under the warmth of his gaze, your tongue darts out as you lick the smoked salt off the rim before swallowing down the shot, not breaking eye contact with him once.

You’re beyond delighted when notice the tips of his ears are a little pink as he throws back his own. The heaviness from earlier shifting into a more exciting kind of tension as your gazes bounce off of each other.

Bradley leans a bit into your space as he sets his empty glass on the bartop, “Can I let you in on a secret?”

“Only if it’s a juicy one,” you counter, more than happy to take the bait.

“It wasn’t just the line. Your little tiara thing is doing it for me too,” he says reaching out and adjusting the rhinestone Bridesmaid headband that you’d completely forgotten you were wearing. His thumb skimming over your temple as he withdraws his hand.

You could handle an unabashed flirt, but a charming unabashed flirt whose smile was setting off a flurry of butterflies in your chest was not on the agenda for tonight.

“Do you want to swap, Rooster?” you tease nodding your head towards the white and shiny black-rimmed hat that is sitting snugly on top of his head.

“Nah, I don’t think I could pull it off as well as you do.” He shoots you another wink, one that has your toes curling in your pretty-but-too-tall heels. “Plus, mine is technically government property. They don’t let just anyone wear it, not without earning it.”

You don’t miss the way his eyes dip down to your lips.

The shot of tequila makes you brave enough to contemplate asking just exactly one would have to do to earn a turn wearing his hat, but the two of you are startled out of bubble you had found yourselves in at the sound of a sharp slap.

You peer curiously around Bradley to see Hangman looking equal parts shell-shocked and starry eyed after your best friend as she struts away from him with a swing in her hips, her hair bouncing with each step.

“I should-” your own eyes betray you by slipping down to his parted lips when you look back at him, “I should go check on her.”

“You don’t have to go just because Bagman is an idiot. Let me get you a drink and return the favor. Please,” he says, his big brown eyes asking you to stay.

“No, I really should. Thanks for indulging my friends and for the company, Bradley. Enjoy the rest of Fleet Week.” Before you can overthink it, you lean in a press a kiss to his cheek. Giving him one more smile, one that doesn’t feel as bright as you’d like it to be, you turn and leave.

You hustle to catch up with your friend as she makes her way back to your bedazzled group, “Hey, are you ok? What the hell did he say?”

She waves off your concern with a Cheshire cat grin, “Oh, that man is about to be so obsessed with me.”

Over the next hour it is impossible to keep your eyes from straying back to him. You try to lose yourself to the music on the small dancefloor and in the raunchy girl talk. Every time you dared to take a peek at him, you’d been surprised to see him already looking at you instead of chatting up some other girl.

At one point, he’d even been bold enough to pat the space next to him as an open invitation. You’d simply smiled and shook your head at him, laughing to yourself when he dramatically clutched at his heart in response.

It’s not until a very large bottle of Dom Perignon Brut Rosé is delivered your table, a cheer going up as the bottle service girl discloses who had it sent over, that you’re made to reevaluate your plans for the evening.

The two men are still at the bar, but you don’t miss the satisfied smirk of on your best friend’s face as she helps herself to some of the pink bubbly.

Instead of a glass, you’re offered a threat.

“We all know what she’s doing, but if I see you at brunch tomorrow I’m kicking you out of the wedding,” the bride-to-be cheerfully trills, albeit tipsily, as she presses your clutch into your hand and shoos you away. Officially dismissed from your bridesmaid duties for the remainder of the weekend.

You take the long way around the edge of the room to the bar, giving yourself a minute to debate the pros and cons of what you were planning to do. But as the crowd parts and you see him, still planted in the same place you’d left him, all the bullet-pointed items on your mental list dissolve like sugar in an Old Fashioned at the sight of his warm whiskey brown eyes.

This time it’s no accident in the way you slide up to him.

“Well, Rooster, you’ve got my attention.”

“Good. I like your attention,” he says with an all too pleased grin. “I was worried I was going to have to come join in you over there. The last bachelorette party we ran into kept wanting me to give the bride a lap dance. It looked pretty dire there for me for a moment. You bridesmaids are an intimidating bunch.”

He doesn’t strike you as someone who would shy away from the attention.

“Feral, drunk, horny women aren’t your thing? Or are you just anti lap dance?” you ask with a cheeky tilt of your head.

“Feral and horny women for sure. And I am very pro lap dance, I’ll have you know. I’m just picky about who I give them too. For example, if you were to ask nicely, I’d be more than happy to demonstrate,” he offers, his cheek ticking up on one side.

He made you feel an exhilarating kind of reckless. And if you were only going to get one night with him, you were going to make the most of it.

“That’s a very expensive bottle of champagne that just got delivered to us.”

“Well, it’s Fleet Week after all.”

“We established that earlier tonight,” you note jokingly.

“So we did,” Bradley acknowledges with a dip of his chin. “And in the spirit of Fleet Week, it seemed like a good gesture to further advance and cultivate better civilian and military relations.”

“Is that what they’re calling it these days?” you laugh.

“Ok, funny girl. Tell me then, what do you think Fleet Week is about?” he asks, settling in and leaning his elbow on the bartop.

You don’t even hesitate.

“Getting free drinks and getting laid.”

“Ok, ok. You’ve got me there,” he chuckles. “Can’t say that hasn’t been part of the draw for me in the past.”

“So you admit you’re doing it wrong,” you can’t help but tease him as you throw a thumb over your shoulder towards the $500 bottle of champagne that’s bubbling away in glasses.

“In my defense, Hangman and I went dutch on it,” Rooster says as he puts his hands up in surrender. “Plus, if you remember, I already had a very pretty girl buy me a drink tonight.” His eyes drag over you pointedly, then lets them linger at your mouth again.

“Only the one?” you ask peering up at him.

“The only one I wanted.”

“And how many others have offered?” you ask, stepping even closer. You can feel the heat rolling off of him in waves even in the well airconditioned room.

He weighs his words before answering, “A few.”

A moment passes between the two of you as crystal-clear clarity settles around you.

The old you would have dropped it, but this version of you, the one you liked being around him was ready to press further.

“So the free drinks have been covered,” you say, fingertips tracing up along the veins of his forearm, “And what about getting laid?”

“I’d be more than happy with a phone number and a date lined up for sixty-two days from now,” Rooster says resting a hand low on your back, his thumb skimming along your bare skin. “But if you wanted, I wouldn’t mind showing you just how invested I am in furthering those civilian-military relations.”

The desire in his eyes makes any lingering doubts in your mind evaporate like a marine layer.

“Is that so, Sailor? How civically inclined of you.”

“Lieutenant Commander, actually,” he says with pride as he straightens up to his full height, his chest looking impossibly broader as he does.

“Lieutenant Commander Bradley Rooster Bradshaw?” you hum, “Now that’s quite a mouthful.”

The low rumble that escapes his chest makes goosebumps erupt across your body.

“You’re trouble,” he murmurs, pulling you closer as he brings his other hand to the curve of your hip.

“Oh please. You handle multimillion-dollar aircrafts for a living, I’m sure you could handle little ol’ me,” you say with a wink.

It’s a challenge, it’s a dare.

“Yeah, I bet I could too,” he rasps, looking at your lips.

He shouldn’t be so easy to like, shouldn’t have you wanting moremoremore when you’ve known him less than two hours.

You bring your hands to his chest, your fingers toying with the little button near the hollow of his throat, “So, you’re shipping out tomorrow…”

You feel as he stiffens slightly under your palms, but his gaze remains steady on you, “Yeah, tomorrow evening. It’s not the greatest of timing, I know.”

“Well then, I guess if there’s a clock we’re working against, we should probably get this show on the road,” you say nodding towards the door.

You watch as the remorse in his eyes is replaced with a mischievous glint. The solemn press of his lips transforming into a slow, knowing smirk.

And you know he’s game.

“You gonna take me home with you, sweetheart?”

“Maybe,” you muse with faux contemplation, looking at him from under your mascara coated lashes, “Do I get a tax break if I do?”

“I’d be more than happy to google it in the cab. And if you do, I’ll even fill out the form for you.”

You see a flash of a grin before he pulls you in for a kiss.

His warm hand and callous fingers glide up your back pressing you against his chest as his lips meet yours. In that moment you are Midas touched, the blood thrumming through your veins feels like liquid gold. Electricity racing from where you’re connected to every nerve ending in your body.

You pull away from him all too soon, smiling to yourself when he chases after your lips.

“I have one condition,” you say, wrapping your arms around his neck.

“Name it,” Bradley says, dropping another lingering kiss to your lips.

“Maybe two,” you concede.

“Name them,” he chuckles lightly.

“You wear a condom.”

“Of course, that’s a given. What else?” He leans back just enough to adjust your sparkly headband from the way it had tilted back on your head.

“And my last request is… that I get to try on your hat.”

“We can definitely make that happen. Anything you want, baby.”

“Well then, if that’s the case, I’m also pretty set on getting to have your cock in my mouth.”

“Jesus Christ.” His hands tighten on your hips, and his brown eyes turn molten.

“I think I’m looking forward to finding out if you’re an officer or a gentleman.”

“I’m definitely both,” Rooster says giving you an all too confident look that promises he has the skill to back up his words, “At least until these dress whites come off.”

You hear another woo! ring out that you know has nothing to do with another delivery of expensive champagne as he takes you by the hand and leads you out of the jewelry box bar.

There are already a few cabs lined up at the rank outside of the hotel. He holds the door open for you, and you slide in giving the driver your address. You’re not sure how Bradley manages to squeeze the bulk of him into the backseat along with you, but you don’t mind the way his thigh presses against yours or the way he rests his heavy hand on your knee or the way his thumb makes maddeningly light circles there.

He laughs when you hold up your phone to him at the flurry of all capitalized and emoji riddled text messages in the group chat that had been created for the evening. And when the driver pulls up to your apartment building, when you try to pull out your credit card, he passes the man a wad of twenties. Way more than the ride cost with a keep the change as he hustles you out of the car.

“Lead the way, baby,” Rooster croons in your ear, his voice low.

And in that moment, you decide you really like Fleet Week.

Who could resist a man in summer whites? Especially when that man is Bradley Bradshaw! Read Part 2 here!

Thank you for reading!

If you missed Hey, Sailor you can catch it HERE!

Wildest Dreams moodboard

You can read my other stories here!

Taglist:

@gretagerwigsmuse @sehnsuchts-trunken @notroosterbradshaw @tongue-like-a-razor @laracrofted @bradshawsbitch @starryeyedstories @top-hhun-main @startrekfangirl2233 @callsign-viper @teacupsandtopgun @shanimallina87 @angelbabyange @oneelleandaneye @mizzzpink @cornishkat @alana4610 @20th-centu-fairy-girl @pono-pura-vida @donttouchmycarrots @eg-dr3amer3 @whaledots-blog @a-beaverhausen @hangmanscoming @mandolin22 @theweekndhistorybook @lilpeekabooze @high-bi-imgonnacry @ahintofkiwistrawberry @ruewrote @spiderman-stilinski @jayniebop @my-soulmate-is-mycroft @imaginecrushes @keyrani @chicomonks @artemissunn @mayempress @eddiemunsonreader

#bradley bradshaw x reader #bradley bradshaw imagine #bradley bradshaw x female reader #bradley bradshaw x you #top gun fanfiction #bradley bradshaw fanfiction #top gun imagine #bradley rooster bradshaw x reader #bradley rooster bradshaw x you #bradley rooster bradshaw x female reader #bradley rooster bradshaw imagine #rooster x reader #rooster x you #rooster x female reader #1989TGM

1K notes · View notes

delusionalme8 · 5 months ago

Note

hey, i have been a fan yours since your Instagram and old tumblr days, so just wanted to pop in ask you how you've been doing? also asking for your hinny fic recs!

Hey, that's actually so cool!

It's been about three years since I stopped using that account. Unfortunately I had to study a lot to get into University and my free time has been greatly reduced. But all in all I'm fine now, thanks for asking. I hope you are too!

There are so many fics that I love that it's impossible to remember them all, so I'll try to fit some in here!

Consider that I like really everything from these authors, so I recommend you read their other fics in addition to the ones I suggest. It's totally worth it!

-Brumous by @seriouslysam8 and its prequels (my personal favourite is Backstabber). As far as I'm concerned, it's one of the best fics I've ever read and she's an amazing writer. She's on a break from Brumous at the moment, but is releasing Selcouth which is just as good in my opinion!

-7 Scandals and a Baby by @ginnyw-potter ! It's a story set during the Regency and has an incredible atmosphere around it! She's an incredible writer and has an insane creativity too. Think of any trope and 99% of the time she's already written about it lmao (if she hasn't already, she almost certainly will). Also, her Harry and Ginny are soo good. (Not a Done Deal is one of my favourites too!)

-These Cuts I Have by Melindaleo and its sequels. It's a trilogy set in the post-war period and it's a wonderful read. I just reread it for the third time and I love the way it deals with Harry's horrible childhood and the relationship he develops with the Weasleys! Read it!

-The Path From You by @takeariskao3 too! I feel stupid for only now discovering her work, but I'm spending my afternoons catching up on it all lol. It's a story full of angst and great tension building before Hinny arrives. But I love a good slow burn, I have to admit, and she wrote it so damn good! I really recommend reading it!

-An Hour of Wolves by @solvskrift ! This one is quite heavy and angsty because it deals with a particularly sensitive subject, but I think it's absolutely worth it. The worst thing is that it's about something that could have easily happened in the canon and it's horrible to think about. I love the way it is written and deals with such sensitive topics, as well as the wonderful characterization of the characters. It is a work in progress, but it is definitely worth reading because it is incredible!

These are just a few fics and I don't know how many more I'm missing, but feel free to recommend me some too!

#fics recs #harry potter #hinny #ginny weasley #hp #harry potter fanfiction #harry x ginny #hinny fanfic

59 notes · View notes

mermaidgirl30 · 1 year ago

Text

✨Tear You Apart Prequel✨

Series Masterlist

A/N: The prequel is finally here! It came to me out of nowhere today while I was listening to “Wait” by Knuckle Puck on a loop. Now that, my friends, is the power of music. I love this little series so much, and it’s one of my favorite things I’ve ever written! I love getting into the pit of Joel’s grief and showing that underneath all the hardness is just a soft man that wants someone to understand him 🥹 He deserves all the love.

Pairing: Outbreak! Joel x fem! reader

Rating: Explicit (18+ Only MDNI)

Word Count: 2.3k

Chapter Summary: This is where it all began, the first time you ever met Joel. He’s mean, rough around the edges, but you see through him. You feel his grief as much as you feel your own.

Chapter Tags: Outbreak au, Joel captures reader, dark! Joel, tender moments, grief, angst, tension, Joel needs a big hug

Dividers by @saradika-graphics

The sharp rope scratches at your skin as you try to free your bondaged wrists from behind your back. You rock against the wooden chair and grit your teeth together as you bite back the urge to scream. It’d be no use. You’re under his watch, under his control, under his eyes. Those dark black pits that are filled with nothing but regret that devours his eyes, feeds on his soul like a pit of ash and nightmares. A monster that devours anything he can control, anything he can get his calloused fingers on.

He wants control, he thinks he has it, but that’s not the case. Not exactly. Because control is a weakness. He’s just a man that’s ruined from a dark world who has nothing left but his own misery to spread to anyone he can claw his jagged nails into. He wants others to feel exactly how he feels. Grief can do that, can change a man into a blood sucking monster. And that’s exactly what he is, the worst kind of them. Vengeful, disconnected, full of regret, used. Just like you are.

You watch him stalk around you, circling you like a vulture as he glides his calloused fingers over your skin. You see the way he moves. Slow, concentrated, shoulders hunched as the green flannel clings to his broad chest. Dangerous, dark, unkind. That’s all he shows, all he knows.

“Let me go,” you demand as you scrape your skin against the rough bindings and hiss when you feel blood against your wrists.

He clicks his tongue and ends right in front of you as he picks up a piece of your hair. “I don’t think so,” he chuckles darkly as he continues circling slowly. “You gonna tell me what you were doin’ outside my house in the middle of the night? Tryin’ to steal somethin’ from me, hmm?”

“No, I wasn’t stealing anything…”

“Liar!” His voice is blaring, echoing through the tiny basement that’s dark and filled with cold cement walls. Only a little light shines in the center of the room. Just enough to see the scowl that’s stretched across his angry face.

“I’m not lying, if you’d only just listen to me!” You fight back, your face burning fiery red as you try to pull free of your bindings again, but it’s no use. You’re stuck.

“I don’t listen to filthy little liars, sweetheart. Should’ve never come around these parts of the woods. It’ll only get you hurt,” he grins as dark eyes fill the dim room.

He slowly slides his fingers down your arm like a sly snake as you feel the bristles of callouses catch against your glistening skin. His skin is warm, burning into yours as you feel the fingerprints imprint into your forearm. He kneels down in between your legs as he rests one hand on your thigh, slowly opening the other as he settles between your legs. And then he looks up at you. That same unattached stare that belongs to the skin of a lone wolf.

“So, jus’ what am I gonna do with you, hmm?” he asks as he glides his fingers over your dark denim jeans. “Maybe paint the inside of your thighs white? Maybe sit you on my lap and have a little fun with you? Maybe…”

You shut him up as you inhale and spit into his face as a glob of your saliva lands in one of his eyes. You see him flare his nostrils as he wipes the spit off with his flannel sleeve and starts chuckling under his breath. “Oh, I like a little fight in a girl. Kinda turns me on more.”

Before you can react, he shoots up and grabs the back of your hair as he pulls hard and forces your eyes up. You grimace in pain as he pulls tighter. You look anywhere but at his eyes, so you just stare at his worn leather boots.

“Look at me,” he demands with gritted teeth as you feel his hot breath blow against the side of your neck. You turn your face and shake your head as you refuse to follow his strict orders.

He pulls tighter against your hair as you cringe and feel a cold teardrop lick at the corner of your eye. You can’t give in, can’t give in to him. You hear him growl loudly as he pulls and snarls a harsh order at you, “LOOK AT ME.”

You feel the tear run down your cheek as you carefully move your eyes to look at him, your eyebrows knit together in frustration as you stare coldly at the man that holds you captive. His nostrils flare, dark eyes burning into yours as you take a real good look at him for the very first time.

He’s so run down looking, tired, just like the broken watch that sits clasped around his left wrist. The hard lines paint maps across his wrinkled forehead, an old scar sits burning across the top of his right eye, his salt-and-pepper scruff is rugged looking as some of his thick, tousled strands of hair fall down into his dark eyes. His green flannel is worn, just like his dust covered boots weighing him down to the ground. And his eyes. There’s sadness, remorse, regret lying in those chocolate eyes. Eyes that beg for someone to take him out of his misery. Eyes that plead for goodness but are weighed down by the hardness of the sick world. Eyes that beg someone to feel everything he does. Eyes that scream for help.

He keeps a tight hold of you, fingers still locked around your hair as he pins you in place, the weight of his body sinking against yours as you feel the roughness of his beard slide against the side of your cheek. Before you know what you’re doing, you speak. “It’s all about control with you, isn’t it? You want someone to control because you can’t control what’s going on around you in this apocalyptic world. You want someone to blame, someone to use to take your own misery out on. Is that right?”

His dark pupils expand as he snarls against your face, his fingers gripping harder as your head snaps up and pain radiates through your skull. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talkin’ ‘bout, sweetheart. Better watch your mouth,” he growls as pain shoots down your neck.

You see the glisten of the broken glass on his watch, wonder why he wears a broken watch in the first place. It hits you like a hurricane crashing against a weak structure, spiraling your insides as if you feel his pain radiate down your body. He lost something dear to him, went through waves of pain you can only imagine. Just like you lost everything in your life.

He grabs another handful of hair until you shout into his weathered face. “I know what it’s like to lose something! You’ve lost someone, haven’t you?”

His snarl lessens as his narrowed eyes relax, his grip on you growing lighter as he breathes in steady breaths. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” he bites back as you see pain as clear as day in his distant eyes. The dark flecks floating around like pieces of the past as loss is etched in shades of dark brown throughout his irises.

“That’s why you do this, isn’t it? You need the control, need to feel something other than the loss you carry. Need someone to fasten yourself to as you let the pain slip from your fingers so you can pour it out to strangers so they can feel that bit of pain you carry every single day.”

His eyes widen, his breath hitching as the weight of your words crashes over him. A realization taking form as his jaw ticks and his thick fingers run down to the edge of your hair. There’s no more pulling, just the mere brush of his fingertips against your thick hair.

“You want to do something to me? Fine, do your worst. But at the end of the day, it’s you that chooses to be a monster. You are the one in control.”

His eyes grow large as his breathing goes shallow. He drops the grip on your hair and stands abruptly as he paces the floor while raking a large hand through his scruff. He looks conflicted, torn up, ruined as he paces and paces the cement floor.

His body stills as he turns and looks at you, his eyes full of regret and sadness as the glint of tears wash over his deep brown eyes. He flexes his hand into a tight fist and clenches his jaw as he huffs out frustrated and grabs a sharp knife from the corner of the room. You freeze up until you realize he’s cutting your bindings free as the tattered rope falls to the floor.

“Go on. Get out of here. Leave,” he growls as he nods his head toward the rusty stairs and gives your shoulder a slight push.

“But I…”

“LEAVE!”

You stumble over to the staircase and start to move, but after the first rusty creak of the stair you can’t help but to look back at the man that burns with pain. You see him pacing back and forth slowly, his face is so tormented. You almost feel bad for him. Almost.

You cautiously step back off the stairs and slowly walk over to him as you shakily reach out a hand. You see his tense shoulders, his lowered head as he holds his hands over his face. That’s when you feel it. The sheer grief that plagues him night after night. You feel it burning deep in your soul as you stare at his weathered features. He’s so lost, scared.

You ever so slowly lift a hand and place it softly over the back of his shoulder, holding your breath as you’re sure he’ll knock you down to the floor. He turns sharply your way, and that’s when you see the glisten of tears in his eyes, a shade of dark blue that covers his entire being. Wrecked. He’s so wrecked.

“I see you. You’re not as alone as you think you are,” you whisper as you let your hand linger timidly on his broad shoulder for just a few more seconds. He stares at it, conflicted features running over his worn face and then slowly turns toward you, eyes the color of chestnut brown. He flinches when you finally drop your hand to your side and step back out of his reach.

His lip quivers, jaw clenching as tight as a fist as he stares at you with big chocolate eyes that glisten with held back tears. You know this pain, the unbearable agony of losing someone so close as they slip through your fingers and never return to the light of day. You know he’s hurting. You know.

You think of running your fingers over his patchy scruff but quickly talk yourself out of it, afraid he might snap at you again. One more look at dark eyes and you’re backing up, turning back to the staircase as you start to tread up heavy steps.

You hear him take a step toward you, hear his leather boots scuff against the hard ground as you look down and see the man with burning eyes. He looks like he wants to say something, looks like he might ask you to stay, but he stays silent. So you go, flee up the stairs, back to a semblance of peace.

Before you turn the old brass doorknob, you look back and find him looking in awe at you, his breathing ragged and his mouth parted open with bloodshot eyes. Eyes that beg you to stay.

“You know, you’re not really the monster you think you are.” His jaw goes slack, his arms heavy at his sides as he stares wide-eyed at you. He doesn’t move, doesn’t even flinch, he just stares. Weepy eyes that cry out for just one soul to listen. You hear him though. You hear him.

You grip your raw, torn up wrists and feel the pain simmer down to your bones. This is the pain he must feel, too. The pain you might just understand. Maybe that’s why you almost stay, almost turn and reach for him again like you could take his pain away. But you don’t. At least not this time.

Before you overstay your welcome, you turn the cold doorknob and push past the opening as you flee the house that holds pain and regret. You slip your way outside and disappear into the thick trees, leaving just enough traces of footsteps for him to find you again.

This wasn’t the end. No. This was the very beginning, a beautiful cycle that’d keep spinning, a whirlwind of you and Joel. The moment everything changed. He claimed you from the beginning, the very minute he let you out of those ropes. It wasn’t over.

He’d find you again, hunt you down till he got his hands on you again. A little lamb that would feed the hungry wolf. A lone wolf that needed to feel again. And you were it. The undoing to his starving form. For he was just a man who longed to rid himself of all the suffering and pain he experienced day after day. You were exactly what he needed. It was you. So he’d follow you through the trees, track you down till he could taste nothing but you. You were the little lamb he desired, craved. And god, did he need you. He needed you…

Tagging some of you that read part 1 🩷 @janaispunk @amyispxnk @mountainsandmayhem @littlevenicebitch69 @lotusbxtch @keylimebeag @untamedheart81 @bbyanarchist @bishtrouille @vividispunk @vivian-pascal @survivingandenduring @wannab-urs @pedrostories @docharleythegeekqueen @rav3n-pascal22 @my-favorite-reading @silk-spun @fanfictilltheend @tuquoquebrute @beardedjoel @msjarvis @syd-djarin

If you liked this, consider reblogging or sending me an ask 💕

#joel miller #joel miller fic #joel miller fanfiction #dark!joel x reader #jackson!joel #outbreak!joel #post outbreak joel #tear you apart #joel miller au #joel miller the last of us #joel x female reader #joel x f!reader #tlou fanfiction #joel miller pedro pascal #joel angst #joel miller smut

137 notes · View notes

achaotichuman · 4 months ago

Note

What's the best tamcien smut fic would you recommend to me? Also are you open in being sent a tamcien smut fic as a gift 👀

HIHIHIHIHIHI

You have come to the right place for recs, I am the resident rec dealer, here are all the tamcien smut fics on AO3, all of them I have read at least multiple times.

I am quite tired at the time of compiling this list, so there is a chance I have missed some, so I would reccomend looking through the Ao3 Tamcien tag to see all the marvelous works all the Tamcien creators have made!

And YESYESYESYESY I AM VERY OPEN TO BEING SENT TAMCIEN SMUT AS A GIFT, YESPLS!!!

Am I making you feel sick? by @yaralulu

Lucien wasn’t a fool. He'd seen the hatred in Tamlin’s eyes, the confusion and disgust vast as he looked him up and down. And yet after the treaty meeting, he seeked him out in his tent anyways. He wasn’t foolish enough to beg for forgiveness.

my lord (and only mine) by @yaralulu

Lucien takes care of his High Lord after he comes back from a rather stressful meeting with his council. “Why not? You’re my High Lord. It seems fitting it, doesn’t it?” Cruel, teasing words, Lucien knew, but he couldn’t help himself. It was just too much fun having that kind of power over Tamlin. It felt too good to see him crumble all because Lucien wore his shirt and called him a certain nickname. Too fun and too easy. “I’m also your friend. Do friends call each other such things?” “Friends.” The corners of Lucien’s lips twitched up unwillingly at that word. “Is that what we are?”

The Fox and The Hound by @samhatch

Every Fire Night since Lucien joined Spring Court, Tamlin has always sought him out to help release the last of the spirits that possessed him. But now that he's mated with Feyre, Tamlin won't need Lucien's help anymore... Or will he? ********************************************************** “I thought you wouldn’t come.” I admitted. I tried to keep my heart from beating too quickly, knowing his heightened senses could hear it. He said nothing in reply, and walked slowly toward me. As gently as the morning dew, he pressed his lips to mine, but I could feel the hunger behind it barely kept at bay. His scent filled my nose, trampled moss and lilac. “What about Feyre?” I asked. “She’s asleep,” he said as he crawled into my bed.

The Wolf and the Fox by @tsunami-of-tears

Alpha Tamlin/Omega Lucien Tamlin is having a rut at the most inconvenient time. Lucien is a cocky shit and not helping the issue.

The Rite of Spring by @nocasdatsgay

Day 6 Poly Week: Celebrations A Calanmai fic. Tamlin and Flora complete the rite, going to find their loves once it is done and the next day help with cleaning up the festivities

Edging || Lucien Vanserra x Tamlin by @sharksscripting

Oct. 21st 2033 — Kinktober Lucien returned to the Spring Court for a visit when he sees it in a worst state than ever, after talking—arguing—with Tamlin feelings evolve and they end up making love.

Cockwarming || Lucien Vanserra x Tamlin by @sharksscripting

Oct. 28th 2023 — Kinktober Part Two of: 𝐄𝐝𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐠 || 𝐋𝐮𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧 𝐕𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐚 𝐱 𝐓𝐚𝐦𝐥𝐢𝐧 — The Spring Court has been regrowing and that causes Tamlin’s workload to triple. Lucien finds a way to help.

A sunbeam shining bright into the night by @nocasdatsgay

After the Great Rite ritual is completed, Tamlin always goes back to the Manor to see if Lucien is waiting for him. This year he is. Tamlin Week 2023 Day 3 Possessive

Play With Fire by Sam Tinnesz by @trshtffc

Calanmai fire just got a bit too hot (Bonus chapter/prequel for In This Peace) (pre ACOTAR)

And an NSFW Tamcien fanart series by @samhatch

Not Safe For Tumblr

Below are all the smut fics I've written.

Hedonism

Tamlin has never been good with words. Much less relationships, of any kind at all. He doesn't know how to fix this; he doesn't know if there's any possibility of this being fixed. But he has to try, for the man that is everything he's ever needed. He will try.

A Proposition

The High Lords meeting is being held in the Night Court, and Lucien is bored out of his brains, but when he realises the Heirs of Night and Spring have slipped off, what would have once been a very boring day suddenly becomes the opportunity for something he'd never even thought of.

Naked Poetry

The Seasonal Courts are gathering for an annual meeting. With tensions growing between the Courts, they aim to settle what they can and allow the magic to return to harmony as it was before the Curse of Amarantha. But after so long away, the magic of each Court is writhing for its sister. From Spring's weakened magic, the power of the Seasons is demanding rejuvenation. Magic comes with a price, and this is theirs. Title from Naked Poetry by SKYLAR would recommend listening to whilst reading.

If you want to see more Tamcien content, I would also recommend checking out my main fanfiction rec masterlist and my personal masterlist

#acotar #tamlin #pro tamlin #lucien vanserra #pro lucien vanserra #tamcien #lucien vanserra x tamlin #tamlin x lucien vanserra #acotar au #acotar fanfiction #acotar fanfic

28 notes · View notes

massivedrickhead · 11 months ago

Note

Could you do something for “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”? Maybe as a follow-up or prequel or something to the prompt you did for “I’m not going to yell at you”? Thanks in advance! 🩵

First off, I'm so sorry this took so long! Usually when I go this long without posting any new fics it's because I'm working on something but I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've written anything in the last month.

I've had probably the worst writers' block I can ever remember having and I've just not felt any desire to write anything or work on any of my wips.

I don't even know if this is any good, but I'm hoping it'll pull me out of the slump.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Prompt taken from here

Trigger warning: physical domestic abuse

This is a prequel to this fic

Read on AO3

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Chloe didn’t believe him.

She swallowed, the pain radiating from her mouth as she forced a steadying breath through her nose.

She knew her lip was bust. She could taste the blood in her mouth, could feel the sting when she swept her tongue across it.

“Chloe.”

Chicago knelt in front of her. His eyes were full of tears, one of his hands cradling the other as if he’d hurt it when it collided with her face. As if he was the one in pain right now.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean…” he trailed off. “Are you okay?”

Chloe wanted to laugh, but instead tears stung her eyes.

“Please don’t cry,” he said. “Please… Please just say something.”

“Can you get me some ice please?” Chloe asked, no longer recognising the sound of her own voice.

He seemed to deflate with relief, and Chloe felt her hatred for him grow.

“Of course,” he said. “Let me help you up.”

Chloe couldn’t help but flinch away from him as he extended his hand towards her, and she saw the briefest flash of anger cross his eyes.

She took his hand and he helped her up and onto her feet before he disappeared into the kitchen.

Now alone, she gingerly touched the split in her lip and winced. It hurt more than she’d expected it to.

He’d never hit her before, and even though he was full of apologies and remorse now, Chloe already knew he would do it again.

He came back with a bag of frozen peas. “We’re out of ice,” he said.

Chloe nodded and took it from him, holding it against her rapidly swelling lip.

“I’m-”

“I know,” Chloe said, cutting him off. “I know you are.” She couldn’t bear to hear him say it again. “Let’s just… Let’s forget it.”

“Sure,” he said. “If that’s what you want.”

The rest of the evening passed in a tense silence until Chloe finally crawled into bed.

She feigned sleep long enough to hear the sound of Chicago’s snores fill the room, and then she eased herself out of bed.

Shoved in the back of her closet was a bag she’d begun prepping months ago. When the rose-tinted glasses had come off, she started to really see those red flags that she’d so often dismissed.

The bag contained some clothes, toiletries, a small amount of cash, and her important documents.

She grabbed it out of the closet and, still in her pyjamas, climbed into her car and drove.

Beca had been fast asleep when the sound of her apartment buzzer cut through her dreams.

She groaned and fumbled for her phone, one eye closed as the bright screen lit up the room.

It was close to 2 am, and her stomach lurched as the noise continued.

She stumbled out of bed and hurried to the front door, her heart beating uncomfortably in her chest as she did so.

No one ever knocks at your door at 2 am with good news…

“Hello?” Beca asked into the intercom.

“Beca?”

If Beca’s heart had been beating hard before, it was doing something else entirely now.

“Chloe?”

“Please can I come up?”

Beca hit the button to unlock the door without a second of hesitation, and she waited anxiously for Chloe to reach her apartment.

Even though she’d been expecting it, Beca still jumped at the sound of the tentative knock at the door and she hurried to open it.

“I’m sorry,” Chloe said. “I’m so sorry for just turning up like this.” Chloe’s hands were shaking as she adjusted the weight of the bag on her shoulder, and her eyes shining with tears. “Please can I stay? Chicago, he’s…”

Chloe trailed off, but she didn’t need to tell Beca what Chicago had done, because Beca could see it for herself.

Beca felt like she couldn’t speak, so she just stepped aside so Chloe could enter her apartment. She shut the door behind them and slid the chain lock across for good measure.

“I didn’t know where else to go,” Chloe said. “I’m sorry.”

Beca shook her head and forced herself to find her voice. “Don’t be sorry,” she said. “Of course you can stay here.”

Chloe seemed to deflate with relief in front of her, and Beca hated that in Chloe’s mind, there might have been a chance she’d have turned her away.

“Stupid question, but are you okay?” Beca asked.

Chloe shrugged. “I don’t think so,” she said, tears filling her eyes faster than she could wipe them away.

Beca wasted no time in closing the gap between them and wrapping Chloe up in a hug. “I’m so sorry this happened to you,” she said. “How can I help? What can I do?”

“Can I go lay down?” Chloe asked, the adrenaline that had been keeping her going was now quickly fading away. “I’m really tired.”

“Of course,” Beca said, reluctantly ending their hug. “Take my bed until I can get the spare room set up. I can sleep on the couch.”

Chloe took hold of her hand. “Please come with me,” she said. “I don’t want to be by myself.”

Beca nodded and squeezed Chloe’s hand. Her throat felt tight. “Go ahead,” she said, the strain evident in her voice. “I’ll be right in.”

With Chloe out of the room, Beca’s hands closed into fists, and she clenched her jaw shut in order to hold back the scream that threatened to erupt.

She’d never felt an anger quite like this before, and she needed it to go before she joined Chloe in the bedroom.

She closed her eyes and imagined herself pummeling every square inch of Chicago. Her jaw was clenched so tight she was amazed her teeth hadn’t shattered.

She counted to ten in her head, and then forced a slow breath out through her mouth.

Her anger was no good to Chloe right now. Chloe needed her to be strong and stable, but not angry.

She could be angry later, but not now. Not tonight.

She filled a glass with water and returned to the bedroom. Chloe was curled up on her side, her face lit up by her phone screen.

“Here,” Beca said, placing the water on the nightstand.

“Thanks,” Chloe said, locking her phone and placing it on her nightstand.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Beca asked, climbing into the bed beside her.

“Not really,” Chloe said. “Not yet.”

“Okay,” Beca said. “That’s okay, you don’t have to.”

“I, um, I don’t really know what to do Bec,” Chloe said, her voice beginning to waver again. She let out a small sob, that was quickly followed by another. “I’m sorry,” she said, quickly wiping her eyes.

“Don’t,” Beca said. “Don’t be sorry, you’ve got nothing to be sorry for.” She lifted her arm so Chloe could cuddle into her side, which she eagerly did.

“What’s going to happen when he figures out where I am?”

Beca felt that anger pulse in her again, but she pushed it away. “I don’t know,” Beca answered honestly. “But we’ll figure it out. I do know one thing though, and that’s that he won’t put his hands on you again.”

Chloe knew it wasn’t as simple as that but she allowed herself, for that moment, to feel safe. To feel protected. She decided to believe her.

“All you need to worry about now is getting some rest,” Beca said. “We can deal with everything else tomorrow.”

#bechloe #bechloe fanfic #bechloe fic #bechloe fanfiction #pitch perfect fanfiction #pitch perfect fanfic #pitch perfect #fanfic #fanfiction #beca mitchell #chloe beale #beca #chloe #pitch perfect fic #hurt/comfort #bechloe hurt/comfort #no matter the timeline

62 notes · View notes

mwolf0epsilon · 9 months ago

Text

Sometimes being in the SW Fandom is about diving into the annals of the internet researching the most obscure tidbit of batshit insane Canon or EU Lore imaginable to man (which is honestly my favorite thing to do because people have done some pretty insanely funny things with this universe and characters). But for the majority of the time, being in the SW Fandom is also watching people repeat a cycle of asinine arguments that make an absolute ass out of them for the worst possible reasons.

So here's a quick reminder of past arguments to be mindful of and always consider, when you see something in the tags that makes you wrinkle your nose at:

Everyone has something they like or dislike about the overall universe and story. Be it the Original Trilogy, the Prequels, the Sequels, the Animated series, the Live-Action series, EU stuff, Novels, etc. No one is above or below anyone else just because they don't love the entirety of the universe and/or the direction the current writers are taking it.

Canon can be a good baseline for your own creative purposes. You don't have to love it (because yes the whole thing can be inconsistent as hell), but don't get to a point in your fanfic/AU world-building where you vehemently deny that canon is an actual thing. This goes hand in hand with your personal depiction of characters vs someone else's depictions. Reading comprehension and the creative process depend on perspective and how you process the information you're given, so it's only normal that no two person's idea of a character is the same. But saying that your headcanons are how the characters should be written by everyone is not gonna do you any favors in the long run, because it's not up to you to decide on that. Don't forget Blorbo's actual roots and what it took to get him where you took him, but don't try to force someone else to accept the journey you orchestrated for them!

No one's OC should be put on a pedestal. It's good that people feel comfortable enough to play Barbies with each other's OCs in roleplay sessions, or even add a cameo in a fic to a character of a friend and/or artist/writer they admire from a distance. Hell, the fact many people are passionate about someone else's little fella/s is great! But the moment someone's OC becomes an object of obsession within a Fandom community, things can go a little wrong... It stops being fun to be in that kind of space that goes from welcoming OC discussions to suddenly shunning new people in favor of someone's Ultimate Blorbo who now has a Cult Following and should be written into every fanfic ever.

No one is evil for lacking knowledge or self-awareness of certain grievances that people rightfully have with the source material. The SW Fandom has always had a long-standing issue with racial stereotyping, whitewashing, cultural appropriation, sexism and many other equally serious topics that have been more eloquently explained in posts made by people much more eloquent and qualified than I am or ever will be. However, one must recognize that not everyone who joins the Fandom is immediately aware of these things. Especially the younger generations that have either not been exposed to these concepts due to one reason or another (upbringing, biased educational curriculum, etc), or because they were simply never in a position where they could delve into these topics with someone knowledgeable on them (some experiences simply aren't universal, especially if you come from a more privileged family). For the most part, SW is just a silly sci-fi universe that is nothing more than a simple means of escapism or dumb fun. Not everyone is going to study it under a microscope or go through it with a fine comb. That said, another important thing to remember is to listen to those who know their stuff and that have had personal grievances with any of the topics above. You can be excused for lack of knowledge, but you cannot be excused for purposefully ignoring the voices of those who provide you said knowledge for free if you go searching.

This is kinda returning to the second and previous topics, but I really need to put emphasis on this: If you're going to cling to certain design choices with an iron first and incorporate them into your personal ideas/headcanons, please always consider how it SOUNDS when you say characters that are written with basis on real POC people/communities are much better/superior if they have phenotypical trait expressions that are not present (or considered rare/atypical) in their real world basis. This is a CONSISTENT problem I have seen crop up specifically within the Clone Wars and Bad Batch sides of the fandom, especially when talking about Rex (who is a blond) and Clone Force 99 (who do not look like standard clones). Always remember: The problem isn't that Rex can't be naturally blond (genetics can be unpredictable and we really don't have an extensive look into the cloning process), the problem is the way some people think he'd be inferior in some way if he were a bottle blond who chose to distinguish himself (almost as if having darker skin, darker hair and darker eyes is somehow worse than having lighter skin, lighter hair or lighter eyes.. How curious isn't it?). Needless to say, I don't think I need to elaborate further on why CF99's "desirable mutations" giving them considerably lighter skin and less ethnic features, while also making their most POC presenting member look and sometimes act like a moronic brute (something which this Fandom pushes further by infantilizing him relentlessly), is a bit of a red flag...

Star Wars has always been political. It is literally in the name and in the meat of the writing. The entire thing is basically a political and social critique presented in a sci-fi/fantasy wrapper, with colorful plasma swords, cool spaceships, and kickass explosion bow on top. You cannot separate the political conversation from the universe's overall lore, and trying to do so makes you look foolish. Disney may have taken creative liberties with some of its shows, but at the end of the day they can't ever eliminate what the Original Trilogies and even the Prequels tried to tell us about. With that said, complaining about how some of the new shows are "too Woke" or PC is the equivalent of saying you read Romeo and Juliet and that the story is relationship goals. You might need to revisit the original material.

For the love of god if you don't like something, don't go after someone who does, it's not worth it. Sometimes the best thing you can do is either filter something you actively dislike/that makes you feel uncomfortable, or simply unfollow/block whoever is repeatedly bringing it onto your doorstep. And you also have no real obligation to explain your decision to block someone, especially if they hound you for questions. Rule of thumb: Don't like something? That's perfectly fine and valid. Take the steps to make yourself comfortable then, but don't go out of your way to be a royal asshole to someone else just because they themselves enjoy it. This encompasses things from anti-jedi demonization, actual ethnic cleansing in canon, siding with personifications of alt-right extremists, proshipping apologism, etc. The block button was added to this hellsite for a reason. Use it.

Sometimes you can't change someone else's opinions on a matter and that is perfectly fine. Just don't start a feud. People come and go, and their opinions vary (we're all individuals with out own perspectives and unique experiences after all), but getting up in arms every time someone either refuses to yield in a long-winded argument, or continuously tries to shove their unsolicited opinions/advice onto you, or even makes incredibly uncomfortable/forward/gross comments that they definitely shouldn't be saying to a complete stranger on the internet, is kind of pointless and will drain you of energy faster than you can say Death Star. You're not the lesser person for walking away from a lost cause. It's ultimately not your job or responsibility to fix/better someone else. Especially if they don't want to change.

#Eps Talks About:#fandom critical #star wars fandom critical #star wars critical #long post #just Eps musing about the sins of the past in the funny space wizards and spaceships fandom

33 notes · View notes

moreespressoformydepresso · 11 months ago

Text

Fandom's Takes On Trauma Are Terrible And Here's Why: brought to you by terrible Coriolanus Snow and Anakin Skywalker discourse

I've been on the verge of making this post for a while now, but I kept not doing it because this might be a bit of a hot take and I don't like offending people. However, I've been growing increasingly annoyed with the perception of one specific character type so lets see how much my dumb opinions stir the pot this time ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. This will be focused mainly on my current main fandom: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes, as well as Star Wars. You'll see why. Now, I need to make it clear that I'm not judging anyone for their opinions on characters for any reason. In no way am I insinuating you're a bad person for having opinions different to mine or that you’re not allowed to have them. What I am saying is that fandoms have some frustrating and frankly insulting beliefs around trauma and those who survived it, and I'm gonna talk about it because I want to get this off my chest. With that said:

Y'all don't understand how trauma works and it annoys me

As stated in the title, I'm writing this because of the Coriolanus Snow discourse, specifically regarding whether he's a good or bad person. Lets rip off the bandaid straight away: He's a bad person. There's no question about it, Snow is a vile human being. And he's one of my favorite characters because of it. He's fantastically written and hands down one of the most realistic, viscerally terrifying yet utterly pathetic villains ever. And what I hate about the TBOSAS fandom more than anything (aside from how some of them treat the actors) is the way they take away all his agency in the story. But I'll put a pin in that because I have a lot to say about him and instead start at the beginning of my growing frustration with how fandom perceives trauma (feel free to skip through this post, I'll label my sections in case you don't wanna read this whole thing). There's two sides, and both are equally stigmatized and wrong. So lets start with the more obvious one through the lens of Anakin Skywalker.

The Star Wars Fandom's Weird Relationship With Traumatized Children Behaving Like Traumatized Children

So Anakin Skywalker AKA Darth Vader is pretty explicitly a Bad Dude who's done some Bad Things. Bro committed genocide, ain't no getting around that, except... It's a little more complicated. Sure, he did all those terrible things, but a lot of people take that to mean he was always a horrible monstrous big bad in the making who was destined to become the galaxy's worst nightmare. That's missing the whole point of the prequel trilogy, because those movies essentially serve to explain all the reasons for Anakin's descent into villainy, and he had surprisingly little hand in it. Growing up into slavery means he not only has a warped view of the galaxy thanks to all the horrors he's witnessed, it also means he lacks the teachings Jedi younglings get when they grow up in the temple. He was pawned off onto Obi-Wan who had only recently been knighted and was in no way ready to raise a child, and became "friends" with Palpatine who fed him all sorts of lies to manipulate him into becoming little more than an attack dog. Not exactly ideal circumstances for a child in their formative years. Did Anakin shirk the Jedi's rules? Yes. Did he do dumb stuff? Yes. But he was a traumatized teenager, of course he's acting out. When he massacres the Tusken Raiders, it's Padme Amidala who reassures him it was the right thing to do. He felt guilty about it, so this idea that he's some apathetic monster from the second he's born is dumb. It's not that Anakin was born wrong, it's that the people around him either failed to help him go down the right path or were actively trying to push him down the wrong one. Anakin never fully grasped the Jedi's ideals, because the person meant to teach him just wasn't equipped to do so. If he'd had someone to teach him how to get a hold of his emotions, distancing himself enough from them to make the best possible decision and helping him understand the importance of letting someone go when you have to, he wouldn't have fallen to the dark side the way he did.

Anakin did terrible things, but blaming it on him just having an evil heart shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how people's environments change who they are. A life in slavery, where he was not allowed to have anything and risked losing what he held dear at any second with no control over it likely caused him to be very possessive of what he held close to his heart once he did have some control over what he kept and lost. Shmi died because he wasn't there to protect her (in his head), so he clung to the people he loved so he could save them the way he couldn't save his mother. Palpatine actively groomed him, if you think that didn't have any effect on him I don't know what to tell you. Throughout the war, he constantly lost people he was close to. That control he had slowly starts to fade as Ahsoka leaves and he starts having dreams about Padme dying. He does everything to save her, only to find out she betrayed him (in his mind, a thought quite likely influenced by PTSD as well). I can tell you that believing one of the few people you trust has betrayed you can make you act very impulsively. Anakin made an impulsive decision and regretted it for the rest of his life. He wasn't born a monster, the world turned him into one.

However, that does not excuse his actions. It explains them and spreads the blame to more people, but his actions are still his actions. Anakin separated himself from his past because of all the pain it brings him, and in doing so he did a lot of bad things. And he still needed to face consequences for those actions, even if the events that led up to them aren't necessarily on him entirely. If he'd gotten therapy, he wouldn't have choked Padme to death. Possibly he wouldn't have attacked the temple. But he didn't, and he did all those things trauma or not. I have major issues with the way some Anti-Anakin parts of the Star Wars fandom insist on ignoring or writing off his trauma, but that doesn't mean I'm absolving him of all guilt.

An explanation is not an excuse, and that sentiment brings us to the reason for this little rant:

Coriolanus Snow's defenders have a habit of infantalizing trauma survivors and I wish they would stop

Oh Snow, how your amazing character completely flew over the heads of most of your loyalest fans. I'm joking, obviously, but also... It's not exactly wrong. Now, I need to make this clear: I'm not insulting Snow fans here. I'm kind of one of them (I hate his guts but I love how he was written, it's a love hate relationship). However, the way people talk about his trauma... I'll be honest, it's kind of sickening for reasons I'll talk about later after getting through the technical(?) stuff. Where the way people view Anakin disgusts me, the way people treat Snow disturbs me. Because people view The Ballad Of Songbirds and Snakes as if it's some typical tragic villain backstory that humanizes and in some ways justifies who he became, to show what changed him from a normal person into a monster. It's not. It actually shows that Snow has always possessed the traits that made him the monster we know from the OG series. What it does is explain why specific things were so important to him and how he grew to lose all redeeming qualities, letting the worst aspects of his personality grow and take over until it's all there's left of him.

What made Snow do stuff like poison political adversaries and constantly beat down the districts so they don't rebel? A thirst for power. A thirst he's always had, born from the feelings of entitlement he held thanks to his family's previous status. He deserves that power in his mind, so he'll do anything to get it. Power, control, and influence are his driving motivators. It's at the back of his mind throughout TBOSAS, and by the time he becomes a gamemaker it's the only motivation he has left. Those traits, the things that pushed him to do what he did, they were always there. There was just more stuff to cover it up. Stuff that fell away with time. Snow is a terrible person, but people pretend he's some poor misunderstood baby who just needed a hug because... why? Because he has trauma. And that's the root of the problem. Does he have trauma? Absolutely. He survived a war, he lost his parents, struggled through poverty while being raised by propaganda from the Capitol and was arguably groomed by Gaul. Sound familiar? It's kind of like Anakin. Horrible childhood filled with loss, less than amazing figures raising him and grooming. Except people use the opposite argument for him which is equally wrong: he's traumatized, so we cannot blame him.

Yes we can.

Trauma does not justify your actions. It might explain them, but you are still accountable for your own actions. Snow murdered people, starting with Bobbin, and every single time it was his choice to do so. It doesn't matter why he made that choice, because he still did it. He ruined countless lives and ended nearly as many, both directly and indirectly. No amount of trauma justifies that. I've seen people claim he's just an anxious young boy who's a poor victim of circumstance, and anyone who doesn't believe so is simply unable to separate the actions of an 80-something-year-old from the 18-year-old, but... No. That's one of the most braindead takes I've ever heard, I'm sorry. Snow hadn't committed the crimes of his older self yet, but the behaviors he shows in TBOSAS are the ones that led him to doing so later on and ignoring that is just stupid. I don't need to judge Snow based on his later actions to call out how fucked up he was in TBOSAS. Again, he chose to murder several people and deluded himself into believing he was justified. That's what makes him a great character. Bad people always believe, on some level, that they're doing the right thing. It's fascinating. But people take his words at face value when he says he's doing the right thing, and the whole point is that he's wrong. He's lying to himself. Because that's what people do sometimes. Snow's family was knocked off its throne, and Snow clung to the idea that the districts are beneath him and at fault to cope with that. He deluded himself into believing Gaul's dumbass theory to justify continuing the games.

It's the exact opposite of Anakin Skywalker: Trauma is relevant, it does inform your perspective on the world and your actions, but it does not mean you can do no wrong. Snow had every chance to be a good person: Knocking Bobbin out or running away instead of murdering him, joining the rebellion with Sejanus, staying in district 12 with Lucy Gray and being honest with her. But he killed Bobbin. He fucked over the rebels and got Sejanus killed. He lied to Lucy Gray and destroyed any chance he had with her. Every chance he got, he threw into the fire without hesitation. Anakin leaned into being a bad person to forget the past, Snow chose to be one because it benefitted him the most. Neither of them are excused because of their trauma, their descent into villainy is simply explained. You know why? Because both of them created new victims. Snow was complicit in the murder of hundreds of children before becoming responsible for thousands more, he killed people with his own hands and ruined several lives over the course of TBOSAS. All that pain he caused isn't erased because we can explain why it happened. Even at 18, Snow has many things he should be held accountable for. War, being an empoverished orphan, being groomed, none of that nullifies the shit he's done. People who say Snow's just an anxious, young, traumatized boy are one side of the horseshoe theory of the myth of "the perfect victim". The "Anakin's Trauma Should Be Ignored Entirely" crowd are the other side. Which brings us to...

It's all horseshoe theory

To conclude the analytical part of my post, I'll bring it back to what I briefly mentioned in the intro to all of this. Agency. That's the running thread here. Both in cases like Anakin and cases like Snow, the fandom takes away all agency a character has in the story for the sake of justifying one's feelings about them. Anakin was born a monster and he was always destined to be evil. It wasn't the trauma, it wasn't the events of the story, he's just bad. On the other hand, Snow is a good person who was made to do terrible things by his trauma. It's all the trauma and nothing else. His bad childhood caused him to be this way and it has nothing to do with his own worst personality traits. See the connection? In both these instances, the characters had no influence over who they became. With Anakin, nothing could've had any influence because he's just born wrong. With Snow, it's everything around him that shaped him into who he was. Both scenarios completely ignore the character and focus on external factors to explain everything. One demonizes trauma victims by saying those that went off the rails are just bad people and there's nothing to be done about it, the other infantilizes trauma survivors by saying they shouldn't be held accountable for their actions just because they have trauma and it's only when they're older and should know better that we can bring consequences down on them.

Victims of trauma should be held accountable, though. The only thing the presence of trauma should change is what kind of accountability. Merely locking them up won't change anything, they should receive help to work through their problems while residing in a place where they cannot hurt anyone else. Including themselves. That is what acknowledging trauma is useful for. But this? This is doing nothing but stigmatizing trauma survivors even more than they already are, and I hate it. And you wanna know why I hate it? Because I've been both sides of this horseshoe, and it nearly got me killed.

The part where I talk about my Tragic Backstory(TM) to explain why this bothers me so much

This'll be a little heavy, so while I'm not gonna go into detail I advise you to please be careful. If you're not in the headspace to handle talk about actual real life mental health issues, feel free to stop reading here. I'm putting this at the end for a reason. If you really wanna know why people's perspective on Snow disturbs me but don't wanna risk getting triggered, skip to the last bold line in this post.

Without going into detail, I've dealt with some pretty big mental health issues throughout my life. One of them is PTSD, so believe me when I say I understand that trauma can heavily influence one's actions in ways even they don't understand. But I had to learn the hard way that there's a difference between explaining and excusing. I used to believe that, because of my previous experiences, I was entirely justified in doing what I was doing. Kind of. At that point, I didn't know that what I was experiencing was PTSD, but I did feel justified in my actions the same way Snow does. I explained every bad thing I did away and wrote it off as nothing or sometimes even as a good thing. Granted, I never did anything as big as committing murder, but I don't live in a country as dark and horrible as Panem so we'll chalk it up to that. As I grew older, I started to recognize the ways in which I accidentally hurt the people around me, and eventually had the realization that my past does not in fact justify the pain I was causing people entirely uninvolved in what happened to me. They had nothing to do with that, and shoving all my pain onto them the way I did was wrong. My view of myself pivoted to the other side of the horseshoe. If I'm not justified, am I... am I bad? Am I evil? Am I just born wrong?

I don't know how to explain this to anyone who hasn't gone through this themself, but that is a horrible feeling to have. To feel like you're just bad and there's nothing you can do about it... It kills something inside of you. A hope, a will to keep going and keep trying. Why bother when you cannot be fixed? I've lost the will to live at two points in my life, and that was one of them. And now I get to see both of these mentalities be repeated by dumbasses who don't understand the first thing about trauma. It's... not fun. It's grating and aggravating in a way I can't accurately bring across with just my words. It makes me wanna scream and laugh hysterically until I cry.

Here's the thing: I relate to Snow, and the way people perceive him disturbs me on a visceral level.

As I said, I justified my own bad behavior the same way he does. I convinced myself I was a blameless poor victim who had no hand in their actions. But just like Snow, I did. Not nearly as much as I would have liked, but I did. I learned to control the defensive mechanisms my trauma gave me, and I grew from it. Seeing people defending Snow with the same arguments that kept me from ever getting over what happened to me, crying out that he's just traumatized so none of it's his fault... it disturbs me. Because they're outsiders who should be able to see the pain he caused others and realize that nothing changes the fact that he did that. But they don't. They're me, without any of the personal stakes that kept me trapped in my own delusions. It's all just fiction, and I know that, but it hits just a little too close to home for my comfort. It's a little too raw and a little too real for me to just let it go and move on again like I always do.

I'm sorry for the rant, I didn't mean to make this post this long but I guess I hope you find something of interest in here that made it worth reading? Have a nice day 💜

48 notes · View notes

bonefall · 1 year ago

Note

The only thing that makes sense to me is if they go back in time like they did for DOTS and do like. I don't know. The life and times of Those Guys before we met them in TPB that isn't a super edition. Which like. No, God, let them rest. They're gonna fuck up and retcon the continuity even MORE.

If this is a prequel arc we are fucking doomed. PLEASE god NO. DOTC was the worst thing this new team has ever written and the fact no one has read it is a fandom mercy

Like I've got problems with where ASC is going, but DOTC was a mistake from Book Triple Fridgegirl Combo to Book Evil Foreigner Pregnant Woman Face Licking, ten gallons of dumpster sludge packed between. There was not a single moment it was a good arc.

I can't handle this, but they ruin more established characters instead. Im not strong enough

#Bone babble

73 notes · View notes

fen-luciel · 9 months ago

Text

A little vent

I just want to say that Disney, once again, has listened to the worst fans and made decisions based on money. Just like they did with the sequels, to be clear.

I usually don't share my opinion because I don't want to argue with others, but Star Wars fans are the biggest hypocrites I've ever met.

Today, everyone talks about the prequels with love, but I clearly remember the criticism and hate online, blaming the actors when the fault was with the dialogue, which was half well-written and half terrible. "The Acolyte" isn't a perfect product, but it could have been the start of something well-built.

Technically, there's no confirmation yet regarding the cancellation of the series, but I'm not optimistic about it. In the meantime, we'll continue to experience it through drawings or fanfiction.

Sorry for the outburst, but I've wanted to say this forever.

#the acolyte #star wars #just a tired fan #qimir

24 notes · View notes

scary-grace · 2 months ago

Text

if my heart was a house (chapter 3) - a shigaraki x f!reader fic

Chapter 1 Chapter 2

Chapter 3

It’s two am, and you gave up on the idea of sleeping well before midnight. Midoriya Izuku apparently wasn’t planning to sleep at all. When you called around eleven, hoping he’d be asleep and you’d have until morning to brace yourself, he picked up the phone, sounding just as chipper as he does in every one of his voicemails. And he’s a talker. You’ve been on the phone since eleven, and you aren’t sorry about it. There’s a lot you need to catch up on. And you’re not the only one. Spinner’s on the line, too.

Spinner was Tomura’s best friend before, and Spinner’s pissed at you. You can tell, and part of you just wants to poke the bear and end the suspense about why. But you want to hear what Midoriya has to say even more, and Midoriya is a seemingly endless fount of information about the state of the death penalty and life in prison. You avoided learning very much about this during the trial. You were trying to hold onto hope, and it already wasn’t working very well. Most of what Midoriya says is news to you. You’re taking notes.

It’s only once he’s given you and Spinner a thorough background in the whole thing that he starts in about Tomura’s case in particular. “What’s interesting about Shigaraki’s case — the thing that jumped out at me first — is the life sentence. The court imposed the death penalty for six of the murders, but tacked on a life imprisonment for the seventh. It got lost in the shuffle of the death penalty thing —”

“Yeah, I never heard about that,” Spinner says. “Did you?”

“I did, but it didn’t mean anything to me,” you say. “It was all just awful. It all meant he’d never be free again.”

“I hear you. But it meant something for sure,” Midoriya says eagerly. “The victim in the life-sentence case was Shigaraki’s biological father.”

You curse. You can’t stop yourself, and Spinner’s voice takes on a note of urgency. “What was that? What do you mean?”

“His dad was –” You hated him when you first heard about him. Now that you’re a parent, you hate him even more, and your limbs start to hum with fury, such that you have to get up and walk it off. “His dad’s the reason Tomura ended up with his adoptive father. He hurt Tomura. I don’t know everything, but it was bad enough that they took Tomura away from the family.”

“So there were mitigating factors,” Spinner says suddenly. “They knew that at the trial?”

“Yes. I dug up a psych evaluation from after Shigaraki was removed from his biological parents’ care, and it had PTSD written all over it. Literally.” Midoriya pauses for breath, then launches back in. “And there’s no evidence that his adoptive father ever pursued treatment for him. Which is — we’ll get into that in a second. Anyway, the fact that the court recognized a mitigating factor in one of the cases signaled to me that there might be room for movement on the death sentence. If I could prove that the same mitigation factor existed across all the murders.”

“We tried that the first time around,” you say. “It didn’t work.”

You remember how dismissive the defense attorney was to you, how it was clear he’d already written Tomura off, how all the money you and Spinner and the others raised wasn’t enough to hire someone who cared. “I heard things have changed a little bit,” Spinner says. “Not a lot, but — Twice counsels kids who are in the system, and he says that they look at that stuff in juvenile sentencing.”

“It’s spilled into adult sentencing as well. The older generation of judges and prosecutors is retiring and the newer ones aren’t as hard-line,” Midoriya adds. “I felt pretty hopeful for at least getting the death penalty knocked down to life for Shigaraki. But once I started looking at the old trial, it was a mess. There was a lot of reason to doubt that Shigaraki actually knew what he was doing at the time of the murders — and when I pulled the confession out of the picture –”

“You can’t do that.”

“His interrogators got indicted two years ago for drugging people who didn’t confess and asking them again under the influence. Yes I can,” Midoriya says. You feel like you’re going to be sick. So much for pacing. You sit down hard. “Once I took the confession off the table, the situation changed a lot. Our legal system, regardless of what the codes say, starts from the presumption that the accused is guilty. I looked at the evidence again, this time based on the presumption that Shigaraki was innocent.”

It’s quiet for a second. You can’t take the suspense. “And?”

“Shigaraki was definitely present when the murders took place,” Midoriya says, “but it’s likely that the only one he took part in was his biological father’s. And it’s not clear that he would have done anything if he hadn’t been under the influence.”

“He was drinking?” Spinner repeats, bewildered. “He’s a lightweight. He’d start throwing up way before –”

“Not alcohol. GHB. That’s –”

“The date rape drug,” you say. Your voice sounds like it’s coming from miles away. “That was twenty-five years ago. How –”

“The same night the murders occurred, Shigaraki’s adoptive father took him to the emergency department, claiming that he’d been drinking. I pulled the records, which included a blood test that was taken at the time. Negative for alcohol, positive for GHB.” Midoriya sounds a little sickened, too. You squeeze your eyes shut. “So Shigaraki’s dad was with him the night of the murders. Shigaraki’s dad took him to the ER due to intoxication on a substance most people don’t use recreationally, but a lot of people use for — you know. And Shigaraki’s dad provided almost all the evidence against him. The state’s case would have fallen apart without it.”

You don’t even know what to say. You should shut up. Instead: “Tomura never got treatment for his mental health stuff. Every time I thought I’d talked him into it, his dad would talk him right back out again.”

“Because he wanted Shigaraki to be unstable,” Spinner says, and swears. “He fucking framed him.”

“Why?” you ask hopelessly. “What would even be the point –”

“I’ve got theories. But that’s not on me to do,” Midoriya says. “One of my classmates from law school is still a prosecutor, and he’s already arrested Shigaraki’s adoptive father. My concern is with Shigaraki, and what’s going to happen when he’s released.”

“We’ve got him,” Spinner says at once. “We can help him get back on his feet. Whatever he needs. We all have money.”

You don’t have very much money, but you want to help, too. You have to help. You have to see him again. “I can –”

“No, you can’t.” Spinner cuts you off, and does it with more venom than he used on Tomura’s apparent psychopath of an adoptive parent. “I don’t even know why you called. You don’t get to care about this any more. You fucking ran!”

“Hey,” Midoriya cautions. “That’s kind of aggressive –”

“I don’t give a shit. He’s finally started writing letters again, and you know who he asks about in every letter? You,” Spinner spits, and your chest deforms from the weight of your guilt. “What the fuck are we supposed to tell him? Sorry, Shigaraki — your girlfriend dropped off the face of the earth and none of us have heard from her in nineteen years? We thought you were dead. Then Midoriya comes up with your fucking phone number –”

“How did you get my number?”

“Uh –”

Spinner cuts Midoriya off before he can answer. “You should have been here with us, fighting for him. You gave up. Why are you even here? Why don’t you go back to living under a rock and let the people who actually love him –”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” you snap. “I didn’t give up. You have no idea what it was like for me, during the trial — everything –”

“Yeah, you had it so hard.” Spinner’s voice is heavy with disdain. “We weren’t having a great time, either. You know what helped? Staying together. You weren’t just his girlfriend. You were our friend, too. You dropped us all like we didn’t matter and ran off when it got hard.”

“Would you shut your mouth? You have no idea how complicated it got –”

“It’s not complicated at all,” Spinner shoots back. “You dropped us and ran away to the countryside to have your perfect little life –”

Your composure breaks, and for once, you don’t try to keep it together. “Fuck you, Spinner! If you would listen to me for two fucking seconds –”

“Mom?” Chihiro’s bedroom door creaks open, and you freeze. “What’s going on?”

The sound of her voice is all it takes to bring you back to earth. To notice how fast your heart is racing, to notice cold sweat dripping down your spine. “I’m just on the phone. I’m sorry it got loud. Go back to bed.”

You stumble through the explanation, but it doesn’t warn Chihiro off. She comes closer. Spinner must have choked on his own spit, because he’s coughing too hard to respond. At first. “Of course you got married and had a kid. How long did it take you to hook up with some loser and forget all about –”

Chihiro reaches over and presses the video call button, then turns the camera towards herself the instant Spinner and Midoriya both accept. “My mom didn’t hook up with anybody,” she says. “Shut up.”

There’s a clatter on the other end of the line as Spinner drops his phone in shock. Midoriya manages to keep his composure a little better. “Hi,” he says. “What’s your name?”

Your daughter introduces herself warily, and shares her age when Midoriya asks. “Why do you want to know?”

“Once — well, we’ve already filed a lawsuit against the government for violating death row inmates’ human rights, and Shigaraki is one of several plaintiffs. And once he’s released, we’re going after them for wrongful imprisonment.” Midoriya’s writing something down. “Part of the lawsuit is proving the negative impact of the government’s treatment of Shigaraki, and this will help. His wrongful imprisonment didn’t just hurt him, it kept you from having a relationship with your dad. He is her dad, right?”

That one’s for you. “Yeah,” you manage. “I didn’t find out I was pregnant until after the sentencing.”

“We’ll need to do paternity testing to confirm, but –”

“They’ll know.” Spinner’s phone is shaking, and you can see the shock on his face. “You look just like him.”

“You look like an asshole,” Chihiro says, and you take your phone back in a hurry, aware that you should be disappointed and sort of proud instead. Chihiro sits down next to you on the couch. “Who are you, anyway?”

“I’m —” Spinner coughs, looks away. His eyes look blurry. “I’m one of your dad’s friends. Spinner. Sorry, I just — you’re kind of a jump-scare. So’s he.”

For somebody with such a striking appearance, Tomura was pretty sneaky. He didn’t scare people on purpose, but he had no problem startling them a bit. You wonder if he’s still like that. How much will have changed since the last time you saw him. “My mom didn’t hook up with anybody,” Chihiro says. “I’ve never even seen her date. She gets sad every winter because it reminds her of him and she definitely still misses him –”

“Chihiro!” You cut her off, but it’s way too late, and Spinner actually looks relieved. You’re — what? Mortified. Sad. Ashamed. Angry. “Stop making that face, Spinner. If you’d let me finish talking, I would have told you –”

“You were still wrong to leave. But I get why you thought you had to,” Spinner cuts you off. “This is good. I’ll tell everybody so they stop putting together a hit squad, and Shigaraki –”

“No,” you say. Spinner, Midoriya, and Chihiro all jump. “Neither of you can tell anyone, especially not Tomura. It has to be me.”

“That’s bullshit. She’s Shigaraki’s kid, too.”

“My name is Chihiro,” your daughter says. “I’m eighteen. I’m not a kid.”

“Okay,” Spinner says after a second. “Yeah. He still has a right to know.”

“And he should hear it from us,” you say. You put your arm around Chihiro’s shoulders. “Not from you. And not right away.”

Spinner argues, but Midoriya breaks in over him. “I agree,” he says. “A prison sentence like his does things to people. I don’t know what he was like with surprises before, but a surprise this big, the instant he’s released — it’s a really bad idea. That kind of psychological shock can hurt somebody. We want his transition back to civilian life to be as smooth and quiet as possible.”

“He’s going to keep asking about you,” Spinner says to you. “You have to say something.”

You think Spinner’s right. What are you supposed to say, though? How can you say anything without saying the two of you have a daughter together? “If he’s going to stay with you at first, send me your address, Spinner. I’ll send a letter for him.”

“If you want it to get here before he does, you’d better mail it tomorrow,” Spinner says. Chihiro stiffens in her seat next to you. “Midoriya, when’s he getting released?”

“Sometime within the next three weeks. Our PR department has a few editorials lined up to hurry things along,” Midoriya says. He grimaces. “Sorry about the article yesterday. We didn’t sign off on that.”

“The Kizuki one?” Spinner looks disgusted. “She’d better quit mouthing off. Toga’s this close to doxxing her.”

“Don’t tell me things like that,” Midoriya says. “We’re working on it, I promise. PR and the legal stuff is my job. Your job — you two, not Chihiro — is to make sure Shigaraki has a soft landing. As soft as it can be, anyway. This is going to be hard on all of you for a little while.”

“No shit,” Spinner mumbles. He yawns. “I’m supposed to do a book signing tomorrow –”

“I have work. And Chihiro has school.”

“Get some sleep,” Midoriya advises. “And you two — work it out. Please. You trying to kill each other won’t help Shigaraki at all.”

He says goodnight and hangs up, but Spinner stays on the call a little longer. “Hey. Uh, Chihiro — can I talk to your mom for a second? Alone?”

“Are you going to be an asshole?” Chihiro asks around a yawn of her own. Spinner shakes his head, and Chihiro looks to you. “If he starts being an asshole again, just hang up.”

You nod and kiss her forehead before she heads back to her room. Once her door shuts, you make eye contact with the camera. “Now what?”

“Look, I shouldn’t have blown up,” Spinner says. “And you shouldn’t have run.”

“I shouldn’t have done a lot of things,” you say. “Why are we still talking? You said you had work in the morning.”

“I do. But this is important.” Spinner looks as serious as you’ve ever seen him. “When you write Shigaraki this letter, don’t promise anything you can’t follow through on. I don’t know how much of what the kid said is true — the kid. You have a kid. That’s insane.”

You resist the urge to roll your eyes. Spinner forges on. “Even if everything she said is true — about you missing him and everything — that doesn’t mean you want to get back together with him. Don’t say something you don’t mean.”

You can do that, you think. You need to figure out what you mean first. You nod. “This shouldn’t be the only time we talk before he gets out. Let’s check in sometime once we’ve both gotten sleep,” you say. Spinner nods, and something occurs to you. “Why’d we both end up on that call? I mean, we were the closest to him, but for something this big –”

“I was there because Shigaraki authorized it,” Spinner says. “You’re here because he named you when they locked him up.”

“Huh?”

“When people get to death row, they have to name the person who will get their personal effects and ashes — afterward.” Spinner looks away. “Shigaraki named you.”

Spinner must give your number out, because over the next week, you find yourself fielding calls and texts from Toga, Twice, Magne, and Dabi. None of them have brought up Chihiro, which means Spinner and Midoriya have kept their mouths shut, but that means that you spend a lot of time being yelled at. You get why they’re mad, but you’re getting tired of people being mad at you. Chihiro being mad at you is more than enough.

She’s not quite as mad as you thought she’d be. It could be a lot worse. She’s still talking to you, still says she loves you when you drop her off at school and when the two of you say goodnight – but the consequences of your lie by omission are lurking in every silence, and when she comes to you with questions, it always turns into a fight, no matter how much detail you include in your answer. They’re small fights, just a few minutes of raised voices and tears. Maybe other parents are used to this with their teenagers, but you and Chihiro never fought like this before. It could be a lot worse, but it’s awful.

You haven’t cried in front of her, but you’ve cried plenty on your own. In the bathroom with the shower running. On walks in the woods where you come back after dark. In the bathroom on your breaks at work when you’ve gotten another angry text or you fought with Chihiro on the way to school. And of all the calls you’re getting, none of them are the one you really want – the call from Midoriya, telling you that Tomura’s release date has been set.

You wrote the letter, like Spinner said. You mailed it the next morning, and Spinner let you know he has it, on one of the multiple daily texts you’ve been exchanging. Your interactions with him are probably the least contentious. Spinner’s trying to get his house set up to host Tomura, and because you lived with Tomura, he has a lot of questions for you.

For some reason, he’s called you today instead of texted you, and he hits you with a question before you’ve even said hello. “What kind of mattress does he like?

“Huh?”

“Soft, medium, or firm. What kind was your bed?” Spinner asks. Wherever he is, there’s a lot of noise in the background. “It would have been one of them.”

“I don’t remember. I think we bought it used.” Neither of you had very much money. “We were sleeping in a twin bed for the whole first year we had the apartment.”

“Yeah. Something was wrong with you guys,” Spinner says. You roll your eyes. “So the mattress – was it really squishy? Or really hard?”

“Neither. I think it was just a normal mattress.” The noise in the background is even worse. “Where are you?”

“I’m at IKEA. Midoriya said we might get news on a release date soon, and I’m not making Shigaraki sleep on my couch,” Spinner says. He’s at IKEA. You’re too bemused at that to really respond. “I don’t have any clothes for him, either. Do you remember what size he was?”

Yes, but – “He could be different.”

“He’s not,” Spinner says, and your stomach lurches. “Skinnier, maybe. What size?”

Spinner’s seen him. He must have. As much as your instincts are screaming at you to ask, you hold it together. “You don’t need to buy him new stuff,” you say. “I still have his things.”

“You – what? Really?” Spinner sounds shocked. “That’s – it’s been nineteen years. You kept all of it?”

“Of course,” you say. You don’t know what else to say.

The trial is a blur, but what happened after it wasn’t, as much as you wish it was. You couldn’t afford your apartment without Tomura, and because you couldn’t tell anyone why you were leaving, you had to pack up alone. You were exhausted. You weren’t sleeping and you were constantly throwing up, and when it came time to deal with Tomura’s things, you got as far as taking his coat off its hook by the door before you burst into tears. You sat on the floor with your face buried in it until it stopped smelling like him.

Getting rid of his things was never an option, not really. Even if you’ve never unpacked them, even if you haven’t looked at them since you closed the boxes, it’s meant something that they’re there. You’ve been waiting for Chihiro to ask about them. Dreading it. But maybe you can get around that. “I’ve got his clothes. And his old games. I can send them.”

“I’ll take the clothes, but you should keep the games,” Spinner says. You blink. “In case the kid wants them.”

Oh. “Chihiro doesn’t really game.”

There’s an awkward silence. “When you tell Shigaraki about her, don’t tell him that.”

You would have gotten Chihiro games if she’d ever seemed interested, but you aren’t much of a gamer, and you haven’t seen her play much except for Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, and really old Pokémon games. Of all the things you’ve worried about when it comes to telling Tomura about his daughter, the fact that she’s not a gamer didn’t factor in, and you find yourself cackling semi-hysterically into the phone. “It’s not funny,” Spinner says, and you laugh harder. “He’s already going to have a hard time with it. What if –”

He's cut off with a series of staccato beeps. You have another call coming in, and when you check the caller ID, your stomach clenches tight. “Midoriya’s calling,” you say. “I have to –”

“Yeah. Go,” Spinner says at once. “He’s probably going to conference me in, so talk to you soon –”

You end the call and accept Midoriya’s, the questions spilling out in an anxious flood before he can even say hello. “Did you find out anything? I know you’re busy and I haven’t wanted to bother you, but – he’s been there for nineteen years and he should never have been there at all. Why is it taking so long to get him out?”

Usually Midoriya would have interrupted by now, but he’s quiet. All you can hear on his end of the line is ragged breathing, and your anxiety goes from uncomfortable to painful in a split second. “Say something,” you plead. “Is he –”

“It’s me.”

You don’t have to ask who it is. You’ve never forgotten the sound of his voice, even if it’s rougher and raspier than you ever heard it, and your own comes out in a strained, airless gasp. “Tomura,” you say. “Are you – out?”

“Yeah.” He sounds so tired. There’s a strange rattle in his breathing. “Midoriya wants his phone back. I can’t talk long. But I needed to hear your voice.”

“I’m – I’m glad you called,” you manage. It feels like the wrong thing to say, but you can’t imagine what the right thing is. You feel like you’ve been shoved off a building – the sick, swooping feeling in your stomach, the inability to orient yourself, the confusion and fear. “Is everything okay? What’s going on?”

Tomura starts to answer, but he starts coughing instead, and Midoriya grabs the phone. “I would have warned you if we’d had any warning, but – it was just supposed to be a pre-release conference. If the judge hadn’t insisted on holding it at the prison – it’s only been a week –”

“Breathe,” you say automatically, like you’re talking to Chihiro instead of to a grown man. “Tomura’s out. That’s good, right?”

“The judge ordered his immediate release, so he can go to the hospital. That’s how much his condition has deteriorated!” Midoriya sounds like he’s vibrating with rage. “I know you want to talk to him, but I need my phone so I can call Kacchan and tell him that if he doesn’t indict Warden Torino and everyone who’s worked under him in the last twenty years –”

“Why is he going to the hospital?” you interrupt. Your voice is shaking. “Midoriya, tell me.”

Midoriya’s not listening to you. “This is why prisoners don’t take legal action even when they’ve been wrongfully imprisoned! They know they’ll be retaliated against with impunity. How are we supposed to effect meaningful change if everyone’s too scared to ask for help?”

“Midoriya!” Your voice cracks. “What happened to Tomura?”

“That’s what we’re going to find out,” Midoriya says. “Dehydration, malnutrition – stop that, you’re supposed to be resting –”

“Give me the phone and I won’t have to fight you over it.” Tomura’s barely audible over the coughing, but when he speaks again, it’s clear he’s got the phone back. “I need to tell you something. I promised myself I would.”

“Okay,” you say. Your heart is pounding. It’s hard to breathe. “Tell me.”

“It was real,” Tomura says. His voice goes quieter, raspier. “It’s still real. I love you.”

He starts coughing again, harder than before, and before you can say a word in response, Midoriya has the phone again. “Can you update Spinner and the others? I won’t be able to make those calls. I have to deal with this – and find a way to protect my other clients –”

“I’ll do it, but you have to update me,” you say. “Even if it’s just a text. I have to know what’s going on.”

“Fine. I’ll work on getting Shigaraki a phone,” Midoriya says. “He can call you once the oxygen mask comes off. Until then I’ll do what I can.”

The oxygen mask. Whatever’s wrong with Tomura, it’s so bad that he’s in the hospital or on his way there. You have so many questions that you don’t have a prayer of getting any of them out. “Okay,” you say, trying to buy yourself time to think, and Midoriya hangs up on you.

You slump back against the wall, your head spinning. There’s cold sweat dripping down your spine, and when you lower the phone from your ear, your hands are shaking so badly that you nearly drop it. Tomura’s out of prison, but he’s in bad shape. Midoriya hung up on you. Tomura called you so he could hear your voice, so he could tell you he loves you, and you don’t know when you’ll be able to talk to him again. And you didn’t have a chance to say it – or anything – back.

Something happened to you when you heard Tomura’s voice, the same thing that happened to you when you found out he’d been exonerated, except this time, you don’t have Chihiro’s presence to force you to ground yourself. It’s like you’re twenty-two again. The world’s turned upside down, everything you thought you knew shaken up and shifted beneath your feet. You don’t know what happens next.

Yes, you do. Call Spinner. Call the others. Tell Chihiro, because you promised you’d tell her as soon as you knew anything, and then finish the rest of your day at work. You can do this. You’ll do it the same way you’ve always done it – one step at a time.

You text Chihiro first. She should be the first one to know that her dad’s out of prison. Then you call Spinner – Spinner, who’s definitely still at IKEA, based on the noise in the background when he picks up. “What’s going on? Midoriya never called me. He’s supposed to let us both know when something happens.”

“It wasn’t Midoriya. It was Tomura,” you say, and Spinner goes dead silent. You take a deep breath, let it go, and on the other end of the line Spinner does the same. Not that it helps much. Everything has changed, and it threatens to overwhelm you all at once – but you’ll handle it one step at a time, until everyone’s looking away and you can fall apart in peace. “He’s out.”

<- Chapter 2

taglist: @shigarakislaughter @deadhands69 @f3r4lfr0gg3r @minniessskii @cryptidfuckerofficial @lvtuss @issaortiz @evilcookie5 @aslutforfictionalmen @lacrimae-lotos @xeveryxstarfallx @stardustdreamersisi @aryuunachigiri

#shigaraki x reader #shigaraki x you #tomura shigaraki x reader #tomura shigaraki x you #shigaraki tomura x reader #shigaraki tomura x you #x reader #reader insert #man door hand hook car door #needle compass north

96 notes · View notes